Ascension and Descension
by RWTalent
Summary: Sequel to The Primordial Prince. James and Elsa's lives are once again thrown back into chaos after a criminally insane man busts himself out of an asylum and starts gunning for James. This time, however, the stakes are higher than ever as allies and enemies from all around the world get involved. [OC, Elsa] [Anna, Kristoff]
1. Prologue

**Whoa, hold up, this is a sequel to the Primordial Prince. I can't stop you from reading this (and I don't really want to) but there will be references and characters already introduced and developed that I don't intend on going into extreme detail to re-explain, and that you will certainly not get unless you've read my first story. Read on if you're truly a fiction mastermind and can simply figure out my entire first story through context clues, and leave a message for me to see if you got it right that'd be interesting to see. But please, go and read my first story anyways, I promise you it'll be good, it's got magic and danger and explosions, all sorts of good stuff.**

 **For those of you who have read my first story and are returning because you liked my first story, you guys are freaking awesome and truly more patient than I am with my favorite writers. Anyways, I won't keep you long because I know how annoying long author's notes are, but I'd just like to say for the moment, I don't have more than a few chapters already written so I don't entirely know how I'm going to schedule chapters but whatever, I'll get it done. Anyways, please favorite, follow, and review. (It makes me write better AND faster!). Enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Prologue**

Two guards strode through the corridors of a dark, damp dungeon-asylum. The only sources of light that illuminated the old, moss-covered flagstones that made up the halls were the occasional wall mounted flame lantern and whatever else people brought to light their way. The two guards in question carried with them a lit candle each that threw just enough light to make the shadows dance around them. Their garb was indistinguishable because they had to hunch over to protect their flames from the constant water dripping from the ceiling above them, seeping through the stones and the dirt above them from the seemingly endless storm that always raged above the keep.

As they walked, they passed numerous cells, closed off with a heavy iron door that had a small slot through which to give the prisoners food, and an even smaller window covered with bars to watch the people inside. The people in question were a mix-mash of all different types of scum, ranging from crazy people who've tried to set the world on fire "for the kicks", to people who believed that they were gods and went around killing people they deemed "unworthy". That's why this place was built a mixture between a mental asylum and a prison, specifically for the criminally insane.

"So, what are you going to do once you've finished working here?" One of the guards asked his comrade.

"I'm getting as far away from here as I can. I'm thinking about moving up to Arendelle, I heard King James and Queen Elsa are fair and kind as rulers. Plus, with all the heroes running around up there, the crime rate has to be at an all-time low. What about you?"

"Huh. I never really thought about that. I was actually planning on going to Corona, I think the current king and queen are great, and Princess Repunzel and Prince Eugene are going to make a great royal family when the time comes."

Their light-hearted conversation was cut short by a dull _thwump_ and a feeling like a huge pillow smacking them both head on, sure signs of a concussion explosion from inside the keep. The two guards shot looks at each other, nodded, drew their swords and quickly made their way to where the explosion originated.

Further down the hallway, where the explosion took place, all the dirt on the floor had been flung everywhere, a large dry semicircle was in front of a door, both having been blasted away. The door in question was bulging out of the doorframe, still in place, but something had obviously bent it horribly out of shape. The guards, knowing that their job was to make sure the inhabitants were both detained and safe, moved to enter the cell.

One of them ran their sword in between the edge of the door and the doorframe and used it as a level to pry the door the rest of the way out. The other guard stood next to him, sword at the ready prepared to defend them both from a psychotic inmate. But nothing came at them.

With the door finally out of the way, the guards carefully made their way into the cell, ready to protect themselves at a moment's notice. The cell was like all the other cells in that it was a horrible place to keep someone, the asylum had recently had budget cuts due to the nation's failing economy, resulting in subpar standards of living.

The cell, like all the others, was dark, no source of light was placed in the cell, and the only light that came in was from outside sources. There wasn't even a window present, that part of the place was underground, specially designed for the worst of the worst. There wasn't a bed in there, instead a small mound of old straw lay pitifully in a corner of the room. There was no extra blanket or cloth given to the inhabitants, besides the standard clothes, in fear of what they might do with it, whether attacking guards or hanging themselves. As with the rest of the underground portion, the cell was damp from the water seeping through the ceiling. What differentiated this cell from all the others was what its inhabitant had placed on the floor.

In the center of the floor, which was somehow kept amazingly clean, were sickening drawings. A rusty, reddish-brown circle was drawn, and a pentagram was drawn in the same place. However, one of the guards who had once upon a time taken to researching all kinds of magic noticed, the points of it reached past the confines of the circle, symbolically meaning magic beyond human control, anarchical magic used for violence and destruction. Above the drawings was a sickeningly blood red haze that floated just above the floor, undulating and twisting. The center of the star was a deep darkness, seeming to reach down into hell itself.

The guards stepped closer to investigate, peering closely at the floor drawings. They were horrified when they figured out that it was drawn in drying blood. Unnerved, they lowered their weapons slightly. Just as they did so, the door slammed shut behind them with an ominous boom. The inmate, a tall man, covered from head to toe in dirt and filth, stood there, smiling with teeth that were stained red. He wore the typical clothing of prisoners; simple pinstriped shirt and pants, no shoes.

"What do you think you're doing prisoner?" One of the guards demanded brandishing his sword at the man.

"Isn't it obvious?" the prisoner asked sadistically. His voice was impossibly smooth for someone who spent their time in the subterranean place, and very deep. "Tell me good sirs, is it true what they say about the Primordial King in Arendelle? A James Alexander?"

"Stay _back_!" they called as the man slowly, churlishly approached, still with his horrible smile. It was then they noticed that unlike the rest of the prisoners he wasn't emaciated, he was actually well built and toned. And the man towered freakishly over the two guards.

The mad man smiled even more, "You know, I'd very much like to meet with this... _remarkable_ man - Primordial - _whatever_."

The man lifted a hand and pointed a crooked finger at the guards. A lightning bolt of red energy shot from his unclipped fingernail and ripped sickeningly through one of them. Then, the man flicked his entire hand to the side, throwing the other guard across the cell and smashed him into the wall with a wet-sounding _crack_. The guard slid down to the floor, and lay there in a crumpled mess.

Satisfied with his work, the man slowly stooped down and picked up one of the candles. When he lifted it up to head level it revealed his face. It could be seen as attractive, but not twisted and cruel like it was. His eyes were piercingly green, but looked like a deadly magical potion or very polluted water. His checks were thin enough to reveal sharp cheek bones and a clear jaw-line. His ragged, unwashed hair, reached down an inch or two below his shoulders. And that his hair, if it wasn't covered in so much filth, was stark, bleached white.

The guard who had been thrown against the wall, managed to force his head to look at the man and rasped, "How...how did you hear about King James? No one is allowed in."

The man laughed cruelly, facing the fallen guard. "You haven't guessed? I've got magic as my play-thing. I guess you could say a little bird told me."

The man, with a hand-gesture, ripped the clothes and armor off of the already dead guard and magically placed it on his body, resizing it and everything. The flame of the candle he held turned blood red. With another horrible cackling laugh, the man swept around and through the broken and unlocked door.

As he walked through the halls, the other inmates in the cells he passed collapsed, their eyes rolled back into their heads and foam building at the corner of their mouths. With a final laugh and a flash of blood red light, the man disappeared from the hall, leaving behind only dead guards, dying prisoners, and a general iron taste in the air.


	2. Chapter 1

**Welcome back! I come bearing gifts, or _gift_ really, another chapter for the story! Just a happy little chapter, something to get you reacquainted with James and Elsa. But as you probably have figured out from the last chapter, this story may be a bit darker than the last one. And that's because...well, the why's not really important. Well that's enough of my rambling, please review, favorite, and follow. And enjoy the chapter!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **James:**

"A little more to the left, a little more. Just a bit further. Perfect." I watched Elsa direct servants, and Kristoff, around the castle courtyard. They were finishing up the preparations for Arendelle's annual Spring Festival, and Elsa wanted everything to be perfect.

I was sitting in a spare chair I found lying around and watching as everyone shuffled around making the courtyard of Arendelle Castle more "springish", as Anna liked to say. The fountains had been surrounded by multiple flower arrangements, and the water it used was made to be even more sparkly. The walls and walkways were lined with bouquets. Huge statues made of plants stood in the courtyard in the shape of the royal family; Anna, Elsa, Kristoff, and me (embarrassingly enough).

I simply watched as everyone bustled around, running from place to place. I had already enchanted all the windows to only show bright, sunny days. And I had used magic to create flower patterns in the long rugs that covered the floors of Arendelle Castle's hall. I had offered to help out in the courtyard, but Elsa being the kind person that she was had told me to relax and recharge. So I laid back and enjoyed the show, taking sips from a drink a servant brought me as everyone else worked hard.

"There, I think that's it." Elsa said, taking a few steps back to stand beside me and observe her work. "What do you think?"

"Looks perfect to me." I said. "Although, I think the ice-dress kind of clashes with the whole spring theme."

Elsa glanced down at her dress, which was made of pure ice that she made herself. You see, Elsa Alexander, my wife, was of sorceress of sorts. Just like me, she had very considerable magical talents, especially over ice and snow. She had long, snow white hair that she always braided and placed over one of her shoulders. Her eyes were startlingly ice-blue. Her skin was pale and smooth, just like fine Chinese ceramics. She typically always wore a blue ice dress coupled with ice heels, a design she had made years ago.

"Oh yeah, I forgot about that. Thanks." She said. She gestured to herself, magically altering her dress. It changed to a more comfortable looking dress. It was of the exact same design as her ice-dress, but green and incorporated flower designs instead of snowflake designs. And her ice heals changed into soft looking flats that seemed a lot more logical and comfortable. "I'll try to find some flowers to put in my hair later."

"You should have let me help you, Elsa." Anna said hobbling over to where I sat. She was wearing an enlarged version of her usual green dress. Her stomach was bloated to a crazy degree, it was a miracle that such a small frame held up such a large mass. And to think, she was only a few months pregnant.

That was going to be a large part of the Spring Festival, we were going to make her pregnancy public. Much to her disapproval, we had kept it a secret from the people of Arendelle, saving it for a big ceremony. And from the very moment Elsa had heard the news, she was constantly doting on her sister, making sure she was beyond comfortable and never in any remote kind of danger.

"Oh no. You're bigger than Sven now. There is no way I'm letting you do anything like this." Elsa said, showing her motherly self.

"Then at least let James help. This'll be so much faster with his help." Anna said, exasperated.

"No. Kristoff and I have got everything under control. Besides, he's helped out enough; he managed to do a majority of Arendelle Castle's interior by himself." Elsa said.

Elsa then swiped the drink from my hand and took a few big gulps. I got a sip or two left in the glass back. "So, what _can_ we help with?" I said, handing my drink off to a passing servant and standing up.

"Are the heroes taken care of?" She asked.

"Andrew and Earlene have got everything covered on that end." I answered.

"Then how about you get the notes for our meeting this afternoon ready?" She suggested.

Again, I answered, "Already been taken care of; Kai was on that months ago."

Elsa's brows scrunched together, thinking hard. "There has to be something you can do..."

"How about greeting an old friend?" A booming voice called to us. "And I brought family along as well."

All of our heads turned to the source of the voice. The man who called was none other than Informius, the Primordial of Knowledge; the world's vastest collection of knowledge on every subject matter and every topic. Informius was shaped like a lamppost; tall and very thin, not as tall as me but tall nevertheless. He had rust colored wiry hair. His eyes were brown and seemed very aware of everything going on around him. And like the first time I met him, he wore elegant robes fitting for a librarian.

Beside him stood another woman. She was actually around an inch taller than him, but just a bit shorter than me. She had silvery blonde hair, like moonlight. It was made into a tight bun behind her head. Her eyes were a mix between blue and green, switching back and forth between the two colors. She wore fine gold and blue dress robes that fit her perfectly. And she seemed to be around fifty-five years old. She was my mother, Catherine Alexander.

"Good morning, James." She greeted with a smile.

"Good morning, Mom." I greeted back, standing up and giving her a hug.

"And to you as well, Elsa, Anna." She continued, always polite. "My, Anna, you seem to be coming along splendidly."

"Thank you Catherine. It's good to see you too." Anna said. Both her and Elsa came and gave her hugs.

"Not that I'm upset about seeing you mom but, why are you here now? The festival isn't for a couple more days. And where's Ethios?"

"Well, Ethios had some Primordial business to take care of, and I thought _hey, in the meantime why not visit my favorite child?_ " She explained. Then quickly added, "And of course my two daughter-in-laws."

"In that case, we'll have a room made up for you immediately." I told her. I waved down a servant and told him to prepare a room in the family wing of the castle.

I then spent the rest of the day walking around the castle and around Arendelle with my mom, talking about all sorts of things. They ranged from childhood memories, which I permanently lost, to the current affairs of other countries. Somehow Elsa managed to convince her sister not to do anything brash, and so Anna and Informius spent their day reading in the castle library. Elsa and Kristoff on the other hand, kept exhausting themselves making sure rooms were made for visiting diplomats and that the right amount of supplies had been either made or imported.

As the sun was going down my mom finally gave in to exhaustion and went to her private room to go to bed. Anna had fallen asleep as well, I found her sprawled across a cushy library couch snoring and hair totally wild. I guided Kristoff to where his wife slept, then even helped him pick her up and carry her to her own bed, Informius opting to stay in the library and sort through the castle's literature. Then I finally went to find my own wife.

I found her after a good ten minutes sitting behind her desk in our study, shifting through paperwork and documents. I leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, just watching.

"Are you going to do something, or just stand there?" Elsa asked with a smirk.

"I was considering whether I should leave you to suffer through that busywork or pick you up and carry you back to bed so you can finally relax for a minute." I said with my own smirk.

"I need to do this, we're behind by a few days." She explained, grabbing her quill and beginning a search for an inkpot.

I gave a nod, deciding. "In that case, off to bed with you it is."

She gave me a warning glare. "James Alexander, don't you dare!"

"Too late!" I said with a grin.

Elsa shot a blast of ice at my feet, which I easily dodged. I quickly made my way around the desk, chasing Elsa who tried to stay on the opposite side, laughing and giggling. Thankfully, my legs were longer than hers so I managed to catch her.

I picked her up easily, being of the small frame that she was she didn't weigh much at all. Elsa laughed and playfully smacked my shoulder, but otherwise didn't put up a fight at all. She laid her head on my shoulder as I carried her through the halls, closing her eyes and drifting already. She really should have let me help, she was going to wear herself out.

In our room, I gently placed her down onto the bed. She used what little consciousness she had to change her dress into a nightgown as I actually put on real night clothes. I slipped into bed next to her, allowing her to snuggle closer to me. I waved a hand and extinguished all the remaining light giving flames in the room, throwing the room into a comfortable darkness.

"It's a good life we live, James. I love you." Elsa mumbled, already mostly asleep.

I smiled down at her calm face. "May it never change. I love you too." And I fell asleep.

* * *

 **Alright, another chapter written, go team! Anyways, hope you enjoy the story.**

 **PeruvianInca:** Glad that you're loving the story. And you can depend on me to keep the story going, I never don't finish something I start.. most of the time.


	3. Chapter 2

**Well, another week and another chapter posted. Now we're finally going to get into a part of the main plot and not an incomprehensible anecdote. I don't have much to say for the moment so I won't hold you back anymore. Please review, favorite and follow, it makes me feel good about the story.**

 **RAWTalent**

* * *

 **Elsa:**

Elsa yawned and stretched. She took a sip of her coffee. A couple of months ago one of James' heroes had come from Italy were coffee was becoming very popular, of course she added her own touch of milk and sugar. She had stopped by the library to check up on Informius, he was still in there tearing through volume after volume, and very content to remain doing so.

James had gotten up early to attend an early council meeting, giving her the morning off. And she was taking full advantage of that. She usually made sure to make herself look extraordinarily regal, trying to make herself match with her unofficial title of "Snow Queen". But that day, she didn't even try. She had been too stressed for too long recently and decided she deserved to dress down for at least one morning.

Her platinum blonde hair was pulled up into a lazy bun with loose strands all over the place. She didn't have any makeup on, not that she usually had any, but her usual lipstick, blush, and eye-shadow had been neglected. Instead of wearing a fancy dress of any sort, she wore a thick, fluffy blue robe that was both comfortable and concealing. And she was wearing little blue slippers with snowflakes on them.

She shuffled through the halls, sipping her coffee and admiring James' handiwork in the castle. James' magic really was incredible, he was able to simply insert the most detailed patterns of flowers in the rugs that Elsa had even seen, even from the kingdom's best seamstresses. Even Anna's magic was incredible, she had gotten very good at controlling her recently discovered power of fire. With James' and Elsa's guidance she was able to obtain near perfect control of it, and was becoming more and more comfortable with it, despite the horrible circumstances in which they were discovered.

Elsa jumped slightly when someone placed a hand on her shoulder. She turned around to see Catherine, her mother-in-law.

"Oh, I'm sorry Elsa. I didn't mean to startle you." She apologized.

"Please, don't worry about it, I was just looking at the decorations." Elsa said.

Catherine looked carefully at the designs in the rugs. She had a faint smile on her face as she admired her son's handiwork. "It was hard, sending James off to be a Primordial, but I think it was worth it. Looking at what he's done here, the life he's built, I know it was worth it. He loves you, you know."

Elsa blushed, with a small smile. "Of course, I love him too."

"Good. So when can expect grandchildren?"

Elsa choked on her coffee in surprise. It took her a few moments to try to regain her breath, watching on was Catherine who just laughed her head off. Once they both managed to calm down, Catherine said, "I'm sorry Elsa, that was just too easy, I had to."

"It's quite alright." Elsa said with a smile.

"But just as a friendly warning, you should be careful. Not that I regret having James, he's one of the highlights of my life, I just wish he wasn't such a surprise."

"Wait, you didn't know you were going to have him?"

"Nope. I had no idea what was happening until well into the pregnancy, I didn't have quite the health benefits as you do as royals. I mean, even afterwards it was still a surprise, I can't even remember giving birth."

"Not at all?"

"Nope. I must have passed out or something. I simply woke up and had a son."

"Really? You must be lucky, that's nothing like what I read in my books." Anna's voice called from behind them.

The two older women stopped to watch as Anna waddled up to them. She took a moment to catch her breath before the three of them continued walking down the hall.

"I suppose I am. But enough about me, how are things coming along?" Catherine asked.

"Pretty well. I'm due pretty soon, the preparations for the Spring Festival are almost completed, my powers are well under control, and I just watched a council member get bodily thrown out of the meeting room." Anna listed off cheerfully.

"Wait, he was literally _thrown_ out?" Elsa asked in surprise.

"Yup, apparently he had been sympathetic with Weaseltown and the Southern Isles and had been trying to establish communication with them without you or James' approval." Anna explained.

"Ah, now that makes sense." Elsa said, nodding to herself. "I could see that happening."

"See what happening?" James asked, rounding a corner and continuing to walk with them.

He was wearing black pants with soft-looking brown shoes and a plain blue shirt. He wore a belt with his sword strapped on his left side. Over top of this he wore long gold and blue robes, formal ones for the council meeting, but they were loosened and open in the front, he never really like wearing stuff like that. Being abnormally tall, his robes kind of looked like a gilded waterfall. A solid gold crown with blue gems set in it sat crooked on top of his messy brown hair, another royal thing James cared very little for.

"The little mishap with one of your councilman." Catherine jokingly scolded.

"Ah. It seems Mr. Scavaal decided to take international relations into his own hands. It won't be happening again, I've made sure neither Weaseltown or the Southern Isles will ever be in touch again, let alone bothering us." James said.

"Good. I'm tired of dealing with them." Anna said, as they all continued down the halls.

"Well, don't worry, you won't ha-" James started to say, but was cut off as a messenger appeared out of breath in front of them all.

"Y-Your Highnesses, t-there's a Southern Isles ship sailing towards the harbor!" the man said.

James and Elsa quickly exchanged a look before running off to the docks, leaving the two other women to catch up. As they ran, James quickly rearranged his robes and crown to look dignifying. And Elsa immediately started using her powers to create an ice dress around her, magically due her hair, and use a bit of colored ice as a stand-in for makeup, and as they ran out of the castle doors she created a simple ice crown on her newly braided hair.

When they finally arrived at the docks, they found them lined with two rows of guards, swords already drawn and ready. The guards gave the two royals a wide birth as they assumed a purposeful and confident stride, James's being significantly more angry than Elsa's. They also eyed James, who drew his sword and held it casually at his side as he stood on the edge of the dock, glaring at the incoming ship.

The ship was a large one, three masts and at least three inner levels. Along both sides were countless holes where cannons would be pointed out. Arendelle hadn't started making ships like that, no need having been found since other countries would much rather interact diplomatically with a country run by a family of three magic wielders with connections to immensely powerful Primordials than get in a war with them. But after having seen so many ships equipped with cannons, being the one to back up the naval defense in the Battle of Arendelle, she felt like they should start making some themselves.

"What don't they understand about 'leave us alone or I'll destroy their entire kingdom'?" James grumbled angrily to himself.

Guard Captain Franz, a decently close family friend, appeared by their side. "Your Highness."

"What are they doing here, Captain?" Elsa demanded.

"We don't know, they haven't sent any negotiation parties. They've just been steadily coming in to dock." The Captain explained.

"As soon as they docked, detain everyone on board and bring me the captain." James said, faint blue lightning crackling in his eyes.

As soon as Franz walked off, Elsa leaned over to James and asked, "What are you going to do, James? Please, think this through." Fearing that her husband would actually follow through with his promise and personally go to the Southern Isles to raze it to the ground.

"I'm going to find out why they're here, then both of us are going to figure out what to do from there." He looked over and locked eyes with his wife, his mysteriously green eyes, their intensity being replaced with compassion and kindness. He gave a small smiles. "Don't worry, I'm not going to do anything rash."

As soon as the incoming ship docked, before the gangplank was even put out, the guards moved on the ship. Some simply leaped from the dock into the ship, climbing aboard pirate-style. Others threw ropes with hooks and climbed aboard. But the guards swarmed the ship like nothing else, the general dislike of the Southern Isles and Weselton showing up in the guards' mad scramble onto the ship.

James, after reassuming his intense and harsh expression, and Elsa then made their way to the side of the ship. The two royals used magic to simply float aboard the ship. James, using his power to simply lift himself up off the ground making his robes flap wildly around him. And Elsa lifted herself with the use of her ice, she also summoned a winter breeze to make the hem of her dress and her cape fly around dramatically. They landed on the deck of the ship in a flurry of ice, wind, and fabric. But their intensity was derailed when they finally saw the people on the ship.

Every last one of them was in poor conditions. They all wore bland, tattered, dirty clothing that hung loosely on them. Even the men on board had small frames, their ribs showing from lack of nutrition and hunched over. They were all deathly pale, and some people looked an odd shade of white/green showing signs of sickness and seriousness disease. They all showed injuries and open wounds, dirty and infected. And they all were huddled close together, partly from an effort to conserve heat because none of them had enough clothing on them to keep them adequately warm. And partly they huddled with fear and anxiety on their faces, terrified by the two royals.

None of the Arendellian guards looked confident in detaining the dilapidated people. Franz stood awkwardly, shifting back and forth, showing his reluctance in the grimace on his face. "Your Majesty, are you sure you want us to detain them?"

James also looked uncomfortable. He quickly put his sword away and killed the remaining wind that was fluttering his robes, as did Elsa. "No, send someone to get a doctor to these people and search the lower decks, and find me the ship's captain immediately."

Franz bowed and started relaying orders to his men. James and Elsa stepped closer together to talk so no one would hear them.

"What happened to these people?" Elsa asked.

"I plan on asking the captain." James replied.

"Why would they come _here_? No Southern Isles ship would come here, they wouldn't try it."

A guard came up from the lower decks with an uncomfortable expression and made his way over to the royals. He bowed at the waist before saying, "Your Majesties, the lower decks are more of the same; packed full of miserable peoples. And there is no captain, we searched the ship and none have been found."

"No captain? How did they make it here then?" Elsa asked.

One of the people then stood up from the huddled group and shakily stumbled over to the two. When he got close enough to them for them to hear he immediately dropped into a full-body kneel; both knees on the ground a bent the body over so his head touched the wood of the deck. "Y-Your M-Majesties, please have mercy on us. Please. We didn't mean to come here, it was an accident."

"What happened to all of you?" Elsa asked. "How did you get here without a captain?"

"The sent was sent off without a captain. We just needed to get away, we only barely managed to dock." The poor man said.

"Why were you sent without a captain? Why are you all like this? I know the Southern Isles isn't _this_ bad."

"No, it's not, Your Highness. We were sent in an emergency. The Southern Isles are falling. We're all refugees."

* * *

 **Dun dun dun. How dramatic. Yeah, I'm going to involve the Southern Isles again, because why not? Anyways, hope you all are enjoying your summer, because mine has mostly been dreading doing summer work for school. Once again, please review, follow, and favorite.**

 **RAWTalent**


	4. Chapter 3

**Alright, chapter 3...or 4 if you count the prologue, but whatever - new chapter! Not much of a surprise since I'm putting out one every week. But I digress. Please review, follow, and favorite. Enjoy the chapter!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **James** :

Elsa and I were watching over the doctors and nurses taking care of the Southern Isles refugees from a small outdoor dining area of a coffee shop. Both of us were unsettled by the arrival of them. And neither of us knew exactly how we would respond to this; of course we would take them in, regardless of where they came from. But what were we supposed to do from there? Not only did we hate them, the entire kingdom seemed to hate the Southern Isles and Weselton, but sitting back and doing nothing would also have major consequences.

"What are we going to do?" Elsa asked, sipping on a cup of hot chocolate. "Have you even heard anything about something happening in the Southern Isles?"

"No, and that's what concerns me." I said, absently stirring my coffee without actually drinking it. "I know we have a delay in news from the Southern Isles, but we still should have heard something, rumors at the very least."

Elsa took a moment to think to herself. Then she asked, "Do you think we should help them? I mean, I hate to say this but if we help them we can rebuild it as a friendly nation."

"That'd probably be the smart thing to do. But we still don't know what's attacking the Southern Isles, we might find something that we can't fight, or worse attract that something to Arendelle." I reasoned.

We sat for a while, taking occasional sips of our drink while we thought through all our options. Suddenly we both thought of a possible solution at the same time. We both looked at each other and said at the same time, "The Heroes!"

During the events of my trials and subsequent wedding two years ago, I was named the Primordial of Heroes. After some time researching my position, I was able to find out what all that title entailed; any power or ability that any hero had, or will ever have, was mine, natural proficiency at any weapon and strategy, increased strength and endurance, and for whatever reason all the major heroes around the world experienced dreams that guided them to me.

Immediately following an unfortunate conflict with the leaders of the Southern Isles and Weselton resulting in total banishment from Arendelle, a huge crowd of heroes from all around the world showed up on our doorstep. After setting them up with places of residence in Arendelle and some employment, I started sending them on missions all across the globe for the betterment of whatever people they found, turns out that they're extraordinarily useful in international affairs. Over time, they had received the unofficial title of the Heroes of Arendelle, "The Heroes" for short.

While technically they followed me and my orders, they aren't officially connected to the kingdom of Arendelle. So they could be sent on missions without Arendelle being involved, very useful for remaining neutral. In theory, we could send a hero over to the Southern Isles, more than confident in their abilities, and nothing would legally link him or her back to Arendelle.

"Do you think one of them could go and check things out?" Elsa asked, always being careful not to get involved with Primordial business.

"That's exactly what I was thinking. Not being tied to Arendelle, nothing will trace back to us, and I have confidence that any one of them could get in and get out without a problem." I said, nodding to myself. "I'll get with Andrew and Earlene and figure out who should be sent. We should know what's going on within a few weeks. Now just to figure out what to do with all these refugees."

"We give them asylum. I'm not just going to kick them out, they obviously need help." Elsa stated.

"We don't have enough room for them, none of our hospitals have enough spaces, and even the castle probably doesn't have enough rooms, we'd have to put some in the dungeons."

Elsa thought hard to herself for a second before snapping her fingers, "Then I'll simply _make_ more room. We may not have enough rooms for them, but we have enough blankets. I'll just make a few buildings for them to stay in."

Thinking it over for a second, it made perfect sense. Being inside Elsa's Ice Palace I know that she could make a sturdy building, they stand up against the elements, and were no doubt much better than were any of them had ever stayed before.

"Sounds like a good idea. Alright, you get on those buildings and I'll get with the Heroes." I said, both of us downing the rest of our drinks and going our separate ways to accomplish our tasks.

I quickly strode through Arendelle's capital city, making my way towards a large, newly constructed building on the edge of the fjord very close to Arendelle Castle. The building was made of smooth, carved grey stone. It was built low to the ground, excluding a single cylindrical tower that served as a sleeping quarter. Along all the walls of the building were countless windows of different color, the result of letting all the Heroes choose the colors. And a small branching dock reached out into the water where many small sailboats could be seen attempting to follow the lead boat piloted by the instructor. The building served both as a residence and training ground for all of the Heroes.

I pushed my way through heavy oak doors that were reinforced with thick iron bars on the side of the short section. Built for efficiency, there was no entry hall or reception area, but instead the doors opened straight into a large rectangular room with a soft padded floor where there was a large class of heroes learned, or practiced, hand-to-hand combat and take downs. In the front of the class, Earlene sat crisscross watching over the students.

Earlene was a petite Asian woman. She didn't have much muscle on her small frame, but having sparred her a couple of times I knew she packed a hard punch with what weight that she did have. She had her waist length, silky black hair tied up in a simple yet functional bun. Her dark eyes scanned the room and the students in it calmly, her cherry red lips curved in her ever present smile. Her sharp, angled features smoothed by her calmness. She wore a tight, emerald green shirt, form fitting black pants, and soft fighting slippers. Over her lap she had placed her favorite wooden staff, sturdy and well-worn, with a few new nicks in it, unfortunately gained from my own distraction.

I made my way over to her and sat down next to her. She shot me a smile and a polite nod of the head. "Good evening, Master James. I heard a Southern Isles ship landed today, care to share?"

"I told you before, call me James. It's true, a ship did dock today. It was full of refugees. Apparently something happened in the Southern Isles, something bad."

"Did none of them tell you what had happened?" She asked.

"No. Either they didn't see what was going on or it was so traumatizing to them that we couldn't get anything out of them."

"You, use your hips more, but do not drop your partner on his spine." She called out to a pair of heroes, one of whom was getting aggressive and not doing it right. Then she turned back to me. "So what are you and Elsa going to do about it?"

"Well that's why I'm here. Do you know where Andrew is? I need to talk to you both."

"He took the newer recruits out on the fjord, knowing him he won't be back for hours." Earlene teased playfully. It was true, Andrew had grown up in Bristol, an English town where sailing was very popular, and he had spent most of his time as a child on the sea and often got lost in the old memories while sailing.

"Well, when both of you guys are free I need to talk to both of you." I said, standing up. "And try to decide which hero is the stealthiest."

Earlene gave me a nod and returned her attention back to the training heroes. I left, back into the busy streets of Arendelle. On the other side of the city, just over the top of the buildings I could see Elsa's magic at work. I could see rapidly growing ice shoot up and join together and create a large blue building where the refugees to stay. I smiled to myself, I always loved seeing her magic work, unlike my magic Elsa's had an innate sense of beauty, whereas mine was just fast and effective.

I watched until the building was completed, then turned to walk back to the castle, having a mountain of paperwork to do on top of getting things arranged with the refugees. I froze when I saw another building pop up. I turned to watch it with scrunched eyebrows. When it was completed and I saw another building start forming, I got worried and started quickly made my way towards the new buildings.

I knew Elsa was extraordinarily gifted in ice magic, but even so, three buildings in one go is a bit excessive. Even destroying three buildings, which is much easier, is physically and magically exhausting. And I got worried, forcing too much magic out at one time is dangerous, my hair is a testament to that. I used too much magic too fast in my Primordial Trials, and it physically damaged my previously stark white hair and even locked away my memories forever. So really it's understandable from my point of view that when I saw yet another building springing up I mildly freaked out. Without any hesitation, I morphed myself into blue smoke and shot up into the sky before rocketing towards the ice buildings. I landed at the site of the in-progress building, rematerializing and frantically looking around for Elsa.

I found Elsa calmly ushering refugees into the four buildings and overseeing the distribution of blankets and heavy clothing to make sure that don't freeze in their shelter. I quickly made my way through the large crowd of people to her, at the same time grabbing a bunch of cloaks from a passing guard.

"Elsa, are you okay?" I asked, perhaps a bit frantically, while helping with handing out the cloaks.

"Yes, of course. Why wouldn't I be?"

"You built four giant buildings without taking a rest." I squinted my eyes and looked closely at her. Besides being concerned about what I was saying, there didn't seem to be any sign of stress or exhaustion on her face. "Aren't you tired?"

"Uhm, no, not tired. A little bit hot, but that's just because it's a hot day. And besides, I built my entire Ice Castle in under an hour, a few simple buildings is nothing." She said.

An idea came to mind when she said that. "Elsa, have you ever truly tested what you can do? How far you can go with your magic?"

"No. I caused an eternal winter for the entire kingdom by accident. If that's not the limit of what I can do, I'm not sure I even want to find out."

"Haven't you ever been curios before? I mean, Elsa, you made _created life by accident_. That's beyond anything any Primordial has ever seen, heard, or attempted before."

"Exactly. Look, I have more control over my powers than I thought I'd ever have, and not only that, but everyone, including myself, have accepted them. But doing stuff like that, creating life, still terrifies me. And I've actually thought this through, I'm not just being scared of my powers. Messing around with life, playing God, won't end well, and I refuse to do so."

After a moment I nodded my head in agreement. "That's a good choice. I wasn't suggesting that you try making more life, I was just asking if you've ever tested to see how much you can do, like have you tried instantly covering a mountain with snow, thawing it, then recovering it? Or another strenuous activity?"

"Hm. Well no, I've been comfortable with staying where I am. I don't need to be a heavy-hitting sorcerer like you." She said with a smile. Yet another reason I loved her; she was smart.

On more than one occasion, I've had to either get involved in a situation I didn't want to, or remove myself from one I wanted to be in because of what I could do. Other nations all around the world had heard of my fight with Lognath and my ascension to a Primordial. Many had begged for me to come to their country to discuss defense treaties or to help defend them. Even in Arendelle, if there was a serious enough criminal I had to get involved because I was the most powerful and most versatile.

And on others, nation's leaders refused to talk to me, or even be in the same room as me because they were afraid, forcing me to leave the room if we really wanted to talk with them. Or people visiting from other nations quickly made their way away from me if they saw me walking down the street. It's depressing really, my power terrifying people when I'm not trying to. Don't get me wrong, sometimes I want to be, like when I scared the King of the Southern Isles and the Duke of Weaseltown into never returning to Arendelle. But most of the time I don't try to be, I'm the Primordial of _Heroes_ for crying out loud!

"Did you talk to Earlene and Andrew about a possible hero for our problem here?" Elsa asked.

"No. Andrew was out on the fjord, and I think it best to talk to both of them about who should go."

Elsa and I passed the last of our piles of cloaks out to the incoming refugees before making our way back to Arendelle Castle. Just past the ever-open gates of the castle courtyard, both Andrew and Earlene stood in front of the castle doors.

Andrew stood in his typical outfit. A crisp white shirt, tan pants, and tall leather boots. He had his two fencing foils strapped to his hip via dark leather belts. His salt and pepper hair slightly mussed from being out in the wind.

"Good afternoon King James, Queen Elsa." Andrew greeted in an English accent.

"Andrew, I've told you a thousand times, call me Elsa." She scolded.

"Of course, Your Majesty." He teased.

"So, have you two thought about what I asked?"

"Of course. And we've both decided on an appropriate hero." Earlene said. "His name is Neil DuFry. He's one of the best we have at stealth."

"You both endorse him?" I asked.

The two glanced at each other for confirmation then looked back at me. "Yes. Like Earlene said, he's one of the best."

"Excellent work, you saved me the trouble of looking myself as well. As soon as he's able, send him to the Southern Isles and make sure he's able to send reports back just as stealthily. I want to know what's attacking them and make sure nothing comes back to bite us."

The two top heroes bowed and started off back to the heroes' training facility. The doors to the castle swung open revealing Anna with her mouth full of chocolate and a large box of the stuff in her hands, Kristoff in tow. "Hey you two. Are you done with that ship yet? Because we still need to get Spring Festival outfits for everyone."

"Anna, me and James can just make outfits for ourselves." Elsa pointed out.

"No. You are not going to create an _ice dress_ for spring. And Kristoff needs a suit as well, so we're going. And that's final." Anna declared in her best mother-voice.

We laughed as she pulled us all down the streets of Arendelle. And me and Elsa were able to put the problem of the refugees and the Southern Isles out of our minds for the time being.

* * *

 **Boom, chapter done. Anyways, I hope you guys are liking this so far, reviewing will help me know that you are but whatevs. Alright, I'll see you all next week.**

 **RWTalent**


	5. Chapter 4

**Surprise, Tuesday update! Consider it my birthday present to all of you! Anyways, please enjoy the chapter. And as always please review, follow, and favorite.**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Andrew**

"Now remember, in no way can you bring any attention towards Arendelle. And do not get involved in anything if you can help it, this mission is strictly recon." Andrew told the hero Neil DuFry.

Said hero was about to board a small, one man sailboat, full of supplies, for the Southern Isles. He was a moderately tall, about half an inch taller than Andrew, French man. One who gained his title of hero from stealing bread and grain from the French monarchy and giving it to the starving French citizens. He had a thin black mustache that matched his slicked black, coal black hair, and brown eyes. He wore nothing indicative of Arendelle; plain brown shirt, plain brown pants, and soft leather boots. Besides his clothes and what he can manage out of the ocean, all that he had was food and a dagger strapped to his waist, partially for protection and partially for utility.

"Do not worry, I understand what I'm supposed to do." Neil said dismissively before boarding the small boat.

"Be safe and remember your training." Earlene said from Andrew's side on the dock.

Neil simply waved one of his hands dismissively over his shoulder as he untied the rope holding the boat to the dock. To which Earlene shook her head in disapproval. Neil hoisted the mail sail of the small, one-mast boat. Within a minute or two, said hero was steadily sailing south.

"He's a bit too confident." Earlene commented as Neil faded from a spot on the horizon into nothingness. "Doesn't show enough respect to those who wish him fortune."

"Ah, he's just young. And unfortunately the young will do as they please. Now, I think James and Elsa should know that we just sent him off."

"Do you even know where they are?"

"Should be back at the castle." Andrew said, turning on his heels and using a hand to spin Earlene as well.

Earlene snorted. "You honestly believe that with a family like theirs, either of them will be where they are expected?"

"In truth? No, not in the least. But it's a start. Besides, it's all the way across town, gives us time to talk." Earlene raised an eyebrow questioningly. "What? I've been out on the fjord most of the time and you've been teaching a ridiculous amount of classes. We hardly ever see each other unless James calls us."

"Mmhm. Sure." She responded.

"So, how has your day been?" Andrew encroached.

"Do you really care?"

"How blunt. I'm just trying to engage in polite conversation."

"Pleasantries bore me, why say them if you don't even care about the answers?" Earlene pointed out.

Before Andrew could respond, a loud crash was heard, followed by a familiar, "Oh, sorry, sorry." Both heroes immediately altered course towards the commotion, knowing that where there was commotion, Anna, and probably Elsa, was close by. Turns out, that rule held true.

Around a corner, the heroes found a toppled cabbage stand and a redheaded princess apologizing rapidly to the vender. He was freaking out for some reason, loudly lamenting his fallen cabbages. Not far from the scene, James, Elsa, and Kristoff could be found looking on with amused smiles on their faces. The heroes, wanting to avoid the incident, instead walked over to the relaxing royals.

"Do you intend on intervening?" Earlene asked James.

James' eyes flicked to the princess and the vendor, then back to Earlene. "Not really, this has happened at least two times in the last ten minutes."

"Three, actually." Elsa corrected. "And by now, the cabbages are beyond ruined so there's no point in setting the stand back up."

At this point the vendor was working himself up to hysterics, and Anna's constant apologies were not helping. Earlene calmly walked in-between the two, placed one finger on Anna's lips to stop her apologies and dropped the bottom of her staff on the vendor's foot, bringing him back to reality.

"Enough, both of you." She turned to Anna. "Princess Anna, please, return to your husband, I'll take care of this." The motherly stern look that Earlene gave Anna actually convinced the princess to do what she was asked without comment. Then she turned to the vendor. "Now sir, face the fact that your cabbages are ruined. But judging by the fact that there are no more than four left, I'd say you've already sold enough to turn a profit. I suggest to just pack up and go home, going crazy here will do nothing for you."

After a second of angry consideration, the man came to the same conclusion and packed up his stand, albeit grumbling angrily to himself. Once he was on his way home, still muttering under his breath, Earlene walked back over to the rest of the group as they all clapped sarcastically. She gave a mock bow.

"Very well handled. Remind me to get you involved when the councilors start arguing amongst themselves." James said with a smile. "So, you've sent off Neil correct?"

Before either Andrew or Earlene could respond, Anna found her confidence again and interrupted. "Ah ah ah, don't you remember? This is a family shopping trip, no business, royal or Primordial." She said sternly. "Now, let's take inventory."

The princess turned to face her husband as he picked up two large bags at his feet. She rummaged through them, "Alright, we've got a new suit for James and a new dress for Elsa." She turned to Andrew and Earlene. "Since I _know_ that both of you _will_ be attending the festival; do either of you have anything to wear?"

The two heroes shook their heads. Both had been to formal celebrations before, but in both cases they had been dressed more for convenience than appearance because both had been attending as security instead of guests. And while they had attended the few festivals that were thrown in Arendelle, neither James nor Elsa quite liked to host them, they were less formal events and wore what they usually did along with all the other peasants who were always invited.

However, the Spring Festival was different than any other party that Arendelle threw. This would only be the third one held since the Great Thaw, since they weren't thrown whilst Elsa was isolated. Only after Anna had begged James and worked her sister charm on Elsa had the monarch reinstated the annual celebration. The difference between the Spring Festival and any other party was that during the Spring Festival, everyone dressed to their best for the majority of celebration, that lasted an entire week.

"Well then, we have more shopping to do!" Anna happily squealed before grabbing Earlene's arm and dragging her off towards the nearest dress shop. She looked over her shoulder and called to Andrew, "When we finish I'm coming for you!"

Kristoff sighed, picked up the bags, and followed after his wife. Elsa and James shot each other knowing looks, something that Andrew had always been somewhat jealous of. The two, who knew each other for little less than a year, and courted even briefer, before they were married , understood each other so well that they could hold entire conversations between themselves only using their eyes. The royals both nodded and started off towards Arendelle Castle.

However, before they left, James told him, "Excellent work Andrew. Without you and Earlene I would be totally lost. But please, take a day off, enjoy the city, I know some of the ladies of the town would love to help you do so-" The royal pulled out a small pouch of coins and handed it to the hero, while at the same time nodding to a small group of girls across the street who had been trying to take discreet glances at Andrew. "-it's on me."

With that said, the king and queen of Arendelle left hand in hand. Andrew glanced at the money, then at the girls, eliciting a round of nervous giggles from them, thinking of how to pass the time before the princess returns. He shrugged to himself, _what the heck?_ he thought to himself, _I need someone to take to the festival anyways_. And he walked over to the group of girls.

They were all wearing fancy dresses, exactly in line with the current fashion trends of European "nobility". All their dresses had frills and intricate laces, and by looking at the shape of them they had steel hoops that puffed out the bottom halves of their dresses. They had all artificially curled their hair and wore dainty hats that did nothing for them. Each carried a fan that they used to hide their blushes. And they all carried tiny umbrellas, more as an accessory than for actual use because they were so small and thin that it would offer them no protection from either the rain or the sun.

He bounced the bag of change lightly on his palm. "Would any of you ladies care to join me for a drink?" Andrew offered with a half smile.

Either it was four hours, or just under one, that Princess Anna found Andrew in one of the local restaurants, Andrew couldn't tell. The girls were, unfortunately, unbelievably dull. So dull and generic of status quo women of the time that Andrew couldn't even remember their names. They bombarded him with requests for stories of his heroics, and vigorously interrogated him about life so intertwined with the famous Primordial Prince and the Snow Queen of Arendelle. However, when he asked questions about their lives, he received bland stories of staying at home and doing essentially nothing.

Anna found and rescued him just in time. For Andrew, being the polite man that he was raised to be, couldn't foresee any possible escape from these prim and properly boring women, and was about to order the Marshmallow, the strongest, and most likely drink to get even angels drunk beyond all doubts. The name was picked up after Elsa's snow golem first visited the city, and the barkeeps were somehow inspired to create a giant, unbelievably strong, ice-cold beer.

But in her infinite generosity and natural social-acuteness, noticed the poor hero's pain and was gracious enough to rescue him from his tormentors. The princess quickly extricated Andrew from the women, pulled him out of the bar and down the street towards the tailor. "Well that seemed painful. Why'd you even agree to talk to them, they are totally not your type."

"Oh, and what is my type?" Andrew asked, not answering the question because in truth he had no idea why.

"I'm not entirely sure, but _they_ were definitely not it." Anna said confidently. Then an idea seemed to pop into her head. "Oh I know! How about I help you get a girl?!"

That idea, quite frankly, horrified Andrew. Not that he didn't trust Anna, but that he had heard of the Hans incident. In addition, while they were certainly friends, it was James and Elsa that mostly talked to him, Anna didn't spend that much time looking over the heroes, so there weren't many opportunities. "Uhh, I don't know if that's as good an idea as you think."

"Psh. Of course it is!" At his skeptical expression, she continued. "I was the one that got James and Elsa together after all."

"That's not what I heard." Andrew said. "I heard they grew close on their own."

"Well, I'm the one that gave them _time_ to grow close together. And besides, I totally called it." She said proudly.

Andrew scoffed but didn't make a comment, as usual there would be no arguing with her. Especially when it came to matters of love and relationships. So he just shook his head and allowed Anna to drag him down the street.

* * *

 **Hope you liked it. I'll post a new one on Wednesday like normal next week. You know what to do; review, follow, and favorite.**

 **Guest: Unfortunately, I haven't gotten around to the SeraphOfKnowledge's fanfics, but its definitely on my list. My bad if I misspelled something, to be honest I only reread to check on the plot.**

 **PeruvianInca: Glad you thought it was awesome. Was this a soon enough update?**

 **RWTalent**


	6. Chapter 5

**Hey guys, sorry about posting this so late at night (or early morning depending where you are). But I spent the whole day either packing or driving across Florida, so I didn't really have much opportunity to upload until now. So please review, follow, and favorite! Enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **James:**

"A letter from the baker, asking us to give him an extra few days for rent?" I asked Elsa. We were sitting in our office, Elsa sorting through papers on her desk, me sitting in a comfortable chair next to the desk. I had stacks of papers surrounding the chair that someone had placed in the completed pile, checking to make sure that whatever was on them was well and truly finished and required no more managing.

"Already done, and he's very grateful." Elsa responded, if a bit unhappily. We often switched off who was dealing with current affairs and who was following behind and picking up whatever the first missed. And unfortunately for her, it was her turn to deal with the current stuff. But I shrugged it off, willed a little magic to my finger tips and within two seconds the paper had burnt up and the ashes had dispersed.

As I was leaning over to pick up another paper the door to the office swung open revealing Anna standing in the doorway. However the gust the door created sent both my papers and Elsa's papers flying around our heads.

"Hey you two! Alright, so you know how I got everyone a new outfit for the Spring Festival?" Anna asked, hyperactive as usual.

Elsa sighed. "Yes, Anna. We know, you just dragged us across the city getting _us_ something to wear. Please, we're kind of busy, is there anything you need?"

"Busy? Didn't the council help you guys get way ahead?" Anna asked.

"Yes. But there's always more. The council helped us get all the foreign stuff taken care of. Now we're dealing with stuff in Arendelle." I explained, easing myself off the chair and starting to pick our papers up.

"Well you can put that away for now, Arendelle is fine! And I've got an emergency. I didn't get anything for myself!"

"And what are we supposed to do about that?" Elsa asked.

Anna shuffled her feet nervously. "Well, I was thinking...I've seen both of you create some really beautiful clothes. And I was wondering if...you know..."

"If we would make you a dress?" I finished for her, an eyebrow raised quizzically.

"Would you? Please, please, please. I promise I won't bother you for the rest of the week." Anna pleaded.

"Oh, Anna, you're not bothering us." Elsa said, getting up and going over to embrace her sister. "Of course we'll make you a dress. You're right, we can put this away for now. Come on James, it's about time for a break anyways."

I smiled. In truth, I freaking hated that stupid office, and I knew Elsa secretly (except for with me) hated it too. In all honesty, being royalty drained us, emotionally, physically, and mentally. From what Elsa had been taught in preparation for being Queen, it wasn't supposed to drain us this much, especially with two of us working at the same time. So we both weren't too upset with the distraction.

I placed the papers that I had picked up on Elsa's desk, then turned to survey Anna along with Elsa. We made subtle gestures, pointing some times, and making vague noises, our own form of communication. Regardless of the lack of details, we both had creating something in mind.

Elsa flicked her hand and blew away the clutter of papers on the floor. I flicked mine and created a sort of blue solid-light dress stand. We swirled our powers around the stand, creating or altering pieces. Half an hour later, we had finished with Anna's dress and were presenting it to her.

The green dress reached almost to the floor, but would stop around mid calf on Anna. The bodice was separated from the rest of the dress by a thin brown belt. The bodice had faint flowers on it made from ice but seemingly like they were sown on. The bottom of the dress had faint folds in green "fabric" that made it look like blades of grass and we designed it to look like grass swaying in the wind whenever Anna walked. All in all, it was very "spring-y", as Anna called it.

"I don't know how you guys do that." Anna said, walking around and inspecting the dress.

"Oh stop it, you can make dresses too." Elsa pointed out to Anna. She was right, after months of practice, pre-planning, and scorched eyebrows, Anna was able to make clothes just as easily as us... except she didn't use ice or pure magic, she used fire. And that tended to have unintended consequences when getting close to her sister's ice-clothes.

"Not as good as you two." Anna retorted. "Thanks you guys. Seriously, you two are the best."

With that Anna eagerly swiped the dress and ran out, probably to show it off to Kristoff. In to the silence of her absence Elsa said, "So, are you feeling like doing _any_ paperwork anymore?"

I smiled. "Not in the least. So, what should we do with all this free time?"

"Well, we still have a few more things to do on our side project." Elsa suggested, stepping close to me. She flicked her hand and a nearby window flew open.

"Let's go then." I said, pulling her up against me. "Hold on."

With a burst of will, both me and Elsa turned into blue smoke and shot out of the window off towards the North Mountain. Unlike the last time I flew us to the North Mountain, just before the Battle of Arendelle, I didn't fly over the city. Instead I flew around it, making sure to fly extraordinarily low, so low that I dodged around the tops of trees, in an attempt to get to the North Mountain unseen.

After our stealthy roundabout of the city, I made a beeline towards the top of the North Mountain. After a few minutes of fast flight, me and Elsa landed in front of Elsa's own ice castle. Now that is a sight to see. The thick walls of the castle glittered in the afternoon sun. A calm, constant breeze around the castle perpetually threw up a flurry of snowflakes, adding to the amazing sight. The towers of the castle reached high up the mountain.

The great doors of the castle silently opened up, revealed the giant snow-golem Marshmallow, a sort of welcoming back. After mine and Marshmallow's first, unpleasant, meeting, which involved me being thrown through a plate glass window of Arendelle Castle after he caught me breaking in, we had come to at least appreciate and respect each other. Me and Elsa calmly walked up the set of ice stairs that led up to the castle, and walked into the main hall.

After the events of my Primordial Trials, Elsa and I decided that hiding away from Arendelle in an unfortified, defenseless cabin in the woods was unwise and decided to start making her ice castle more friendly to live in. For example, in the main hall we had changed small sections of the walls into clear ice to serve as windows. We also had placed a few benches and chairs and rugs around wall. The most substantial change we made is that Elsa had allowed me to enchant all of the castle's insides so that it wasn't anywhere near as cold as the sub-zero temperatures the castle originally harbored.

A notable absence from the castle were the tiny snowgies that Elsa had accidentally created while she had a cold during Anna's birthday. Despite our best efforts to keep them in the castle, the little snow creatures had somehow found a way out and every last one of them had escaped into the surrounding area. We had worried for a while, but no reports of them every turned up to the castle, so they had fallen pretty low on our priority list.

We made our way through the castle, taking a few hallways and going down a few staircases, actually into semi-man-made caves inside of the mountain courtesy of me, my magic, and a few dozen cups of coffee. We entered a particularly large cave lit by a few dozen blue orbs of light. Adorning the walls of the cave hung maps and diagrams of Arendelle, other cities, technologies that had intrigued us, and various other pieces of paper. On the floor of the cave, pushed against the walls were racks of weapons and devices that me and Elsa had tested our powers on, in an attempt to recreate my signature blue sword for the rest of our family and possibly some private body guards, however every attempt had failed for some reason.

But the project that had consumed a large chunk of our free time and our magical research. In the center of the room stood a large sturdy wooden table. On the table stood a scale model of all of Arendelle, every building and every street and every tree in the city was precisely sized and exactly built. But the most interesting part of the model was that, when it was powered up to its fullest, it could help us reach out to the city and manipulate some objects or, if both Elsa and I gave it our all magically speaking, it could theoretically transport a person all the way to any point in the city instantaneously, and possibly back.

Of course, we hadn't actually tried it because we wanted to keep it a secret. Plus, it required our full concentration and a large amount of magic to work and we wanted to make it so that only one of us needed to operate it.

We circled the table, examining it both physically and magically by holding our hands over it to feel the underlying magic currents. After a while Elsa finally said, "Do you think it could be possible that some of the trolls' crystals could help power it?"

I thought about it for a moment, "Power it, no. However, that does bring up a good idea. The crystals act as foci, so it _could_ cut down on the focus needed to operate it."

"I bet Kristoff and Anna could get some for us."

"But then we'd have to let them in on this before it's finished."

"Well, there's no rush to get it done anytime soon. And I'd rather enjoy my time away from running a country than discussing how we'll breach this topic." Elsa stated, making towards the cave entrance. "Care to join me on the balcony?"

"Of course." I responded, following her up the stairs.

We got to the balcony and stared out over the Arendellian mountain range. I wrapped my arms around Elsa's waist as she leaned back into my chest. The gentle breeze stirred our hair and made the loose parts of our clothes flap around us.

"I don't know how much longer I can take being queen." Elsa told me softly.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"The meetings, the politics, the paperwork, I don't know how much longer I can keep doing it. And it's not even that busy a time for the country." She explained.

"So, are you planning on abdicating?"

"No, I don't want to see Anna have to take on all that responsibility just because I can't. Plus, if I abdicate then you will as well."

"How is that a problem?"

"Because you're a good force for Arendelle, a good ruler. And I abdicate us, there's no going back. You won't be able to retake power after I die. I mean, you'll live for practically ever unless you're killed, and if I abdicate you'll never be able to go back to ruling."

"Trust me Elsa, I don't _want_ to rule. I thought I expressed that at our wedding. Abdicating is completely acceptable to me. And please, don't think about how long I'll live. I have a hard enough time as it is."

Elsa nodded her head, and we resumed looking off the balcony. Content on letting the unfortunate fact that I was a Primordial and therefore wouldn't die until the day someone kills me. But in my head, I made a silent vow that somehow, I would figure out how to extend not just Elsa's but my entire new family's life.

* * *

 **Again, sorry about the timing of this chapter. But you know, life happens. So please review, follow, and favorite.**

 **RWTalent**


	7. Chapter 6

**Neil:**

After nearly four full days of dull uneventful sailing from Arendelle, Neil finally spotted the Southern Isles on the horizon. He quickly sailed around to an uninhabited section of the island country. A long stretch of grey flatland, a few rotting stumps here and there told that him that it had once been a forest. He roped his boat up to a large rock on the shore, then took out a change of clothes.

He switched his decently fancy clothes he got while in Arendelle for a set of rags that Southern Islanders call clothes. He wrapped a scarf around his neck and pulled it up over the lower part of his face. Then he bundled up, and made his way inland, towards where he believed the nearest city would be located.

Neil finally arrived at the capital city, obvious due to the large castle in the center of the city. Usually, the area immediately around the castle would be higher class showcasing gilded facades and fine marble stonework, but in this city, there was no high class section. The entire city, excluding the castle looked worse than the worst-off slums of Arendelle. Houses reduced to ruins and even little pits on the side of the road with a fireplace in the center showed signs of being lived in recently. The consistently grey cloudy sky added another level of depression to the dilapidated city.

However the strangest aspect of the city were the people in it. There were a few people bunched together in houses. However, the streets were strangely devoid of people, there wasn't a single person walking around. And the people huddled together in their "houses" were both dead silent and nearly as motionless as statues.

Wanting to remain at least a little inconspicuous, Neil moved as slowly as possible between and through houses, avoiding the main streets and wide open areas at all costs in case someone was watching for intruders. The citizens glazed over eyes didn't even move to simply recognize that there was a new person walking amongst them.

During his entire trek through the city, towards the castle, Neil encountered no resistance whatsoever. From a deep shadow in a house next to the castle, Neil inspected the place for a possible entrance. He had reasoned that there was no way that he could gather information in the city; if the citizens couldn't, or wouldn't, react to the most basic stimulus of sight there was no way they were going to be able to answer his questions. So he took in as many details about the castle that he could.

The cobblestone castle was separated from the rest of the city by a large moat running entirely around it. The castle itself was more stereotypical of European castles that were subject to many attacks, probably due to the horrible royal family it housed, the castle was mostly a giant grey rectangle surrounded by a slightly taller wall with cylindrical towers on each of the four corners. One each of the walls' sides was a large gate and drawbridge that could be raised or lowered at a moment's notice, currently they were raised even though there wasn't any sign of an attack in the city.

The sky started turning even darker than it had been, telling Neil that the sun was setting and the day was coming to an end. Quite frankly, Neil was getting tired of his trip. While Arendelle was certainly no Paris, it was definitely way beyond the drab Southern Isles, so he was anxious to return as quickly as possible. So he came up with a plan to get across the moat and into the castle so he could grab something of use and get back to his boat. Then, he sat down in the remains of what he assumed had once been a house and waited for night to truly set it.

The sun never actually showed itself from behind the ever-present clouds. So Neil determined that it was night time after the sky had become completely dark. Neil smiled slightly as he checked his surroundings before beginning the infiltration. The clouds that always darkened the sky persisted even during the night, blocking the light of the moon. And in addition, as expected, no one lit any fires or created any light, no one came to light street lights, and even in the castle there was no light to be seen. Put together, this meant that the entire city was bathed in darkness, making Neil's plan even easier to accomplish.

He quickly dashed through the remaining streets from his resting place to the edge of the moat around the castle. There he took a second to pull a little earth magic trick that Earlene had taught him not too long ago. She had asked to meet him on the fjord, and he had arrived on time only to find Earlene apparently standing on water in the middle of the fjord. After begging for the secret to the trick, Earlene finally taught Neil how to manipulate the silt on the bottom of the fjord into becoming stiff pillars that one could walk on that were also hidden slightly beneath the surface of the water.

So Neil took a few minutes to work that magic. First he pushed his magical sense past his body and down into the moat, finding enough silt to get him across. Then, with a bare hand to bare dirt, he reached down into the earth to pull out enough energy to do the trick. Lastly, he put the magic he gathered from the earth into use. He used his will to manipulate the magic to form solid pillars of silt reaching up from the bottom.

Once done, and after he took a minute breather, he quickly leaped from pillar to pillar making his way across the moat. The only way to tell that he was soft splashes of his feet in the shallow water above the pillars as there wasn't enough light to see him. Once across, he moved on to the second part of his plan; actually getting into the castle. He silently walked up to one of the castle's walls which was full of holes and nooks and scrapes from either besiegement or neglect. And it was there that Neil employed what James himself had taught him.

Every so often, when breaks in his royal responsibilities allowed him, James would come down to the Hero's headquarters and give lessons himself. And one that had stuck with Neil was when James had taught the heroes how to climb up buildings and jump around from platform to platform. Neil often practiced in and around Arendelle, becoming quite adept at it.

So he employed his skill and slowly made his way up the wall using the holes and nooks as hand and foot holds. Neil gratefully pulled himself over the top of the wall and dropped slightly down onto the walkway, his scraped up bloody fingers burning like fire. He gently ripped strips of fabric from his disguise and used it to wipe his fingers clean, then took another two to somewhat wrap up his injured fingers. _No way in hell am I climbing back down that wall_ Neil thought angrily to himself, making a mental note to find a different way out of the castle.

After taking care of his fingers, he stood up and made his way into the castle via a wooden door on the floor of one of the towers leading to a winding staircase. Not really knowing where to go, Neil was reduced to wandering the halls of the castle trying to find where the study was. It was there he supposed that any documents that might give some insight into what had happened to the Southern Isles.

As he walked the halls, he noticed that there wasn't any damage, nothing taken and no signs of looting. And yet he couldn't find anyone, no, any _sign_ of human life in the castle. And yet it was obvious that, before whatever had happened, the occupants had been excessively self centered. Countless portraits of rulers of the Southern Isles hung on the walls in solid gold frames. Large diamonds and priceless gems were on display on stands every so often. Even the "woodwork" had been carved into elaborate patterns and had precious gems and metals imbedded in it, and the wood seemed to actually be made of ivory.

Neil was no stranger to costly things just because you could, as a matter of fact his bloodline could be traced to French nobility and therefore he owned and lorded over a grand estate in the countryside of France which had tons of fancy things like this. But he had never seen such blatant disregard for budgeting and humbleness. Whatever people said about him and his questionable amount of money spent on things such as clothes and silver cups and whatnot, he _never_ spent money on something that he didn't believe he couldn't almost immediately make up, being the wise and actually conservative businessman.

His disgust for the Southern Isles had been established long ago, but now forever cemented in. A long time ago his father had taken him to the King's Court in France to see how politics were conducted, selfishly and ignorantly he had found, and in attendance as a guest was a representative from the Southern Isles. The representative had been so rude and arrogant to everyone in the room, including the king, that not only had he been physically thrown out of the castle by the guards but a decree had been made that France would never even consider allying with the Southern Isles, excluding only the most dire world-ending crisis. But that unfortunate gathering had forever made Neil see the Southern Isles with disdain and contempt, and so happily read any news regarding the misfortune of the Southern Isles that he could find.

That is how he knew that the Southern Isles had been bankrupt for the longest time. After blowing their final chance at an opportunity for fair trade, that would greatly improve their economy, in Arendelle the country had sunk into a deep depression. As a matter of fact a small nation, its name forgotten by Neil, had claimed much of the Southern Isles' army and ships as compensation of debt both before and after the horrific defeat in Arendelle at the hands of the Arendellian royals, the Primordial Prince and their allies. It would be understandable if many other countries had come to claim gold and materials and whatnot as compensation, but seeing the sickening display of money wasting left in the castle led him to believe it was something else that had happened to the country.

After much exploration in the deserted castle, Neil finally found the room that would be the king's private study. He pushed open the study's heavy doors, Neil let out an aggravated grunt. Knowing what a good ruler's study looked like from seeing James' and Elsa's paper-filled and busy-looking study, Neil was once again disappointed in the Southern Isles, although he should have expected it. Where James and Elsa kept their study neat and organized, Malek left his study a giant mess. Overturned empty wine bottles, ruined papers strewn everywhere, stains and dirty marks all across the floor and the walls. The large desk where Malek should have worked was overly ornate, dark fancy wood with expensive looking carvings and decorations, once again augmented with precious gems. The surface of the desk, instead of being covered in important documents, was cluttered by bags and piles of gold coins and other valuable objects with the signs of being collected by taxmen.

Neil scowled, from just what he'd seen in the castle, the Southern Isles could have been able to support its people. Instead of living in hovels and crumbling houses, people could actually be living in suitable and safe homes. _Ridiculous,_ Neil thought, _These self-absorbed arrogant royals could have saved this country if they had just cut back on their own expenses._

Neil tried looking around the room for anything that could be of use but found nothing. All the papers in the room weren't even important regarding the Southern Isles, all being reminders and set-up of meetings where the royals would be sculpted or painted, or a new shipment of fine clothes for them would be arriving. But not a single thing about the well-being of the county or anything regarding what could have happened to it. Eventually he gave up, angrily kicking the desk in frustration and then grabbing a few handfuls of gold coins and valuables as repayment for injuring his fingers for nothing.

Giving up on stealth entirely in the empty castle, Neil angrily stomped through the castle halls knocking over displays and taking down pictures out of spite, all the while grumbling to himself. Somehow, he managed to find his way to the throne room. A giant golden throne sat high above the room, gold and ivory tiles inlaid in the floor, and even more self-promoting paintings hanging. However, unlike the rest of the castle, this room wasn't devoid of life.

Kneeling in front of the throne was a defeated looking Malek, king of the Southern Isles. His head had been sloppily shaved clean off, evidence by the many cuts on his now smooth head. He had many fresh and painful looking scars on his face. He was dressed in ripped up rags, which was stained with dry blood. And his once cruel eyes now held sorrow and submission.

And yet that was not the most disturbing sight, it was instead the other man in the room that set Neil's nerves on edge. In the throne sat a sinister looking man. He was freakishly tall, had messy white hair, was thin enough to be unhealthy, dressed in elaborate red and black robes and had an evil smile beneath piercing sickly green eyes. Evil and corrupted undertones aside, the man looked almost exactly like paintings Neil had seen depicting James before his hair had turned brown. But this man lacked the courage, loyalty, and happiness inspiring presence that James unknowingly commanded.

The man in the throne like disappointed, like a child who hadn't gotten the gift he was expecting. "You are not James Alexander."

 _He even sounds like James_ Neil thought. "No, I am Neil DuFry of France. However, I am one of King James' heroes."

The man narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. Then said, more to himself than to Neil, "I suppose that is for the best, I'm not quite at the height of my power, I can wait and build up my power a bit longer."

"Who are you?" Neil asked, trying to sound demanding. However, the man didn't seem too threatened, in fact he looked amused.

"You don't know who I am?" He asked curiously.

"Who are you and what has happened to this place?" Neil asked, referring to the entire city and supposedly the rest of the country.

"Ah yes, do you like what I've done with it?" The man asked smugly. "A lot more subdued thankfully."

"You did this?" Neil asked, slowly moving his hand towards the knife he had secretly strapped to the back of his belt. "Why?"

"Mmm, jealousy I suppose. But if you really don't know who I am, then you couldn't possibly understand." The man said. The more he talked, Neil found, the more he sounded both sadistic and insane.

"And are you going to tell me who you are so that I can understand?" Neil asked, stalling and making noise to cover the sound of his slowly drawing his dagger. And he also sank down into a more defensive stance.

"Well if you insist." The man said, standing up to his full height. The spread his hands in a grand gesture, "I am Damien Alexander, the sorcerer."

An explosion of red magic burst out from Damien's body and knocked Neil from his feet and back a few feet. Neil's dagger skittered across the floor away from his hand. When Neil was finally able to refocus his eyesight and lift his head off of the floor, he saw Damien slowly walking towards him.

"Not sure if 'the sorcerer' is that impressive actually. Any ideas for another?" The man asked distractedly.

Neil tried scrambling over the floor to his dagger, but was stopped by magic red tendrils that wrapped around his arms and legs. Wherever the tendrils touched him, either to direct skin or on clothes, his skin erupted into agonizing pain. The tendrils lifted Neil off of the ground and turned him to face Damien, who was smiling just a bit too happily as the red tendrils spouted from his fingertips.

"Nice try, well...in truth that was actually pretty pathetic. So tell me," Damien asked. Another tendril formed on his finger and moved up in front of his face. The tendril honed itself to a razor-sharp tip and pointed between his eyes, getting dangerously close. "Do you want to return home?"

* * *

 **For anyone confused about who Damien is, and didn't heed my warning at the beginning to read the Primordial Prince, don't worry; you'll be able to figure it out in later chapters along with the characters. Thank you guys for reading, reviews, follows, and favorites are more than welcome.**

 **RWTalent**


	8. Chapter 7

**Well, here's the last pre-written chapter I have, from now on I'll have to write all the chapters which isn't bad it's just a lot of work. Anyways, I've really got nothing more to say... so please review, follow, and favorite, it really helps to make me feel good about the story and make me want to write more, ask any fanfic writer. Enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Elsa:**

A week. The Spring Festival had been delayed for an entire week. On the day that the festival was supposed to begin, an enormous storm had blown in and still hadn't let up in the slightest. Fat and heavy raindrops splattered noisily against the windows, lightning lit up the dark sky, and thunder boomed and rocked the windows in their frames. Because the storm was sitting right over Arendelle, her and James had called off the festival due to the danger posed by the lightning.

At the moment, Elsa stood looking out of a window at the drenched streets of Arendelle. She was slightly spaced out, thinking and reflecting on her situation; what she could do, what she should do, and what others would think about what she has and will do. Luckily, the festival was ready to begin at a moment's notice; everything was ready and prepared, the only thing to do was officially begin it, when the storm blew in. Thankfully, James, with a little help from the heroes, had enchanted all the decorations and stands to be resistant to the weather. So the moment the storm stopped, they would be able to quickly move into the celebrations.

"What are you up to?" James asked, snapping Elsa back to reality. He offered her a cup of hot chocolate, her favorite drink.

"Just, thinking." Elsa said, taking the cup. "Do you think this storm will let up any time soon?"

"I have no idea. I'm going to guess it'll be a while before it goes away."

"I suppose you're not willing to stop the storm with magic?" Elsa asked.

"You're right. I'm not. Too many factors, I have no idea what that'd do to the weather's balance."

Elsa nodded her head in agreement. There had been some seriously weird weather patterns immediately following the Great Thaw, even though Arendelle had only been frozen for around a day. So she dropped the idea of using magic to start the festival and took a drink.

"So, have you heard that Anna has taken an interest in Andrew's love life?" Elsa asked, boredom of being stuck in the castle for a week waiting for the storm to cease.

James' expression became slightly confused. "What do you mean ' _taken an interest_ '?"

"I mean, Anna has taken it upon herself to help find the right girl for him." Elsa explained. She moved over to one of the comfortable couches in the library. Both her and James sat down next to each other, a slight reminder of when they had only recently met.

"Why would she do that? First off, she kind of got quite a bit on her plate to begin with." Anna continued to test the limits of her powers and learn new tricks. She also was trying to convince James and Elsa to let her play a larger part in royal matters. And on top of that, she was pregnant and supposed to be taking it easy, although in retrospect that's kind of a contradiction; Anna and taking it easy. "And second, wouldn't she be better suited to help another female to find a guy?"

Elsa giggled slightly, remembering asking Anna this not too long before. "Anna's always had a thing for setting people up. I probably told you about all the times she had tried to get me to go on dates before you showed up. And she chose Andrew because when she had tried to help Earlene, she got shot down _hard_."

James chuckled at this. "I can believe that. Andrew's too polite to reject Anna, but Earlene absolutely _will not_ be a part of that."

Elsa swirled her drink in her cup, not wanting to be boring, even though she know James loved her enough not to care, so she asked, "Have you gotten any news from the hero in the Southern Isles?"

"No." James responded, looking troubled. "But we should have gotten something back by now."

"Well if he sent a messenger pigeon, it could have gotten lost in the storm." Elsa tried to reason.

"True. But it just feels like there's something wrong." James said.

Elsa sat up a bit straighter, suddenly more interested. "What do you mean 'there's something wrong'?"

"I don't really know. It's like there's something off in the world." James tried to explain, but couldn't find the right words. He rubbed his eyes in frustration. When his hands came away from his eyes, Elsa saw that the green in them had been replaced by shimmering gold and were slightly glowing.

"James, your eyes."

James checked his eyes in a nearby reflection to check his eyes. He turned back to Elsa and gave an apologetic smile. "I should probably find out what's going on, sorry."

James gave her a small kiss before standing up and leaving the library. Elsa finished her drink before getting up to leave as well. Elsa once more found herself strolling through the halls of Arendelle Castle, reflecting on how her life had turned out. She had control over her powers, she had her sister back, and a husband that she loved. Her family had been rebuilt, and when her niece or nephew was born her new family would start to grow.

Elsa's reflection was abruptly cut short when she rounded a corner whilst someone else was doing the same the other way and they ran straight into each other. Both Elsa and the other person where knocked down when they collided.

Elsa shook her head as she got up off the floor. She was surprised to find that the guy who she had run into was Informius. "I'm so sorry Informius, I didn't see you there. Where have you been, you weren't in the library?"

"Oh, I was just filing some paperwork." Informius said, brushing himself off. "I was actually just heading back there."

"Wait, you were filing paperwork?" Elsa asked. Not that she didn't trust him to handle her paperwork, she just didn't like that someone could have found some sensitive documents.

"Well, no. Curiously, it was already done when I got there. Not that I'm upset with that, Primordial paperwork is both complicated and sometimes ridiculous, and the fact that half of the time it's not actual papers and more sent thoughts and emotions. But you don't want to hear about that, you have to deal with so much already. Anyways, if you will excuse me I'd like to get back to Socrates' writings." With that, Informius continued on his way back to the library.

 _Huh_ , Elsa thought, _even Primordials have to deal with paperwork, I wonder if James has to do any_. She shrugged and continued on her way. But it wasn't long before she ran into Earlene who was walking around aimlessly as well.

"Ah, good evening Earlene." Elsa greeted her friend. Both being somewhat introverted, they naturally drew closer together as the more social people interacted. So over time they had become at least semi-close friends, royal duties tended to make making actual friends very difficult.

"Good evening, Elsa. Are you busy at the moment?" She asked.

"Not right now, why?" Elsa asked.

"Has James mentioned anything about the mission in the Southern Isles?"

Elsa remembered her conversation with James only moments before. He had said he felt like something was wrong, and then his eyes had started turned from green to gold which usually meant the Primordials were about to get involved in something. "Yeah, he said that he thought something was wrong, but he couldn't describe it. Then his eyes turned gold and he had to go. Why do you ask?"

"Interesting, I thought I had felt something similar. But I suppose if James already knows about that, there's no need to bother him with my vague thoughts." Earlene reasoned.

"Fair enough. So, how goes the heroes' training?" Elsa asked.

"Well enough. But tell me, do you know what Anna is planning for me?" She asked.

"What do you mean planning? I didn't know she was planning anything."

"She insisted that she help me find a man. When I rejected her, she dramatically 'vowed' to accomplish her 'quest'."

Elsa giggled at her sister's antics. That sounded just like something that her sister would say, as dramatic and showy as possible. "How very Anna-like. But I don't think she's gunning for you anymore, she told me she gave up on you and was trying to get Andrew with someone."

Earlene narrowed her eyes, searching Elsa's face for signs of lies. "In any case, I'll be watching her closely."

Elsa was about to respond when a messenger ran up to the two. He gave a bow to Elsa before speaking. "Your Highness, Mistress Earlene, a ship has been spotted sailing towards us. It's coming from the direction of the Southern Isles but flies our flag."

For a second, Elsa was relieved; James wouldn't have to worry about the mission in the Southern Isles. But then she glanced at Earlene, who look shocked and even more concerned. "Earlene, what's wrong? Isn't it good that Neil is coming back?"

"No. Why would he be coming back so early? He couldn't have actually _been_ in the Southern Isles for more than a day or two. The only way he could have figured something out is if whatever happened was _very_ bad."

Elsa turned to the messenger, "Thank you. Please, find King James, don't disturb him, but tell him the news."

As the messenger bowed and started walking deeper into the castle, Elsa and Earlene quickly walked in the direction the messenger came; towards the exit of the castle. They found Andrew waiting just inside the door wearing a thick grey hooded cloak, holding another smaller one which he handed off to Earlene. Elsa created a cloak of her own, hooded, thick, and enchanted to not dissolve in the heavy downpour.

They waited a moment, until James came flying around a corner wearing a thick blue cloak. The doors were opened, the group pulled their hoods down and pulled the edges of the cloaks, and walked out into the storm.

After trudging through muddy pathways and over massive puddles they finally made it to the edge of the docks, drenched from head to toe. The strong winds buffeted the group, causing the bottoms of their cloaks to flap chaotically around their legs.

Slowly but surely the silhouette of a ship formed in the distance. The group waited, albeit impatiently, as the silhouette came closer and closer. Eventually the boat was able to dock and a cloaked Neil DuFry climbed out.

To say he looked roughed-up would be an understatement. His clothes were tattered and ripped all over, his cloak had numerous holes, and he was covered in bruises and cuts and burns. But his expression was totally blank.

"Neil, what happened?" Andrew asked. "Why did you return so soon?"

Slowly, Neil turned his head to Andrew. "Very simple, actually. But I believe it would be best if we discussed this in the castle."

Non-verbally we all agreed at the same time that none of us wanted to stand in the rain, so at the same time we all pivoted on the balls of our feet and started trudging back to the castle. Once safely inside, everyone stripped out of their cloaks while Gerda started a fire in a nearby sitting room.

Neil remained standing as Andrew and Earlene sat in two chairs and scooted up close to the fire to dry off, Elsa and James however sat down completely dry Elsa having frozen all the water on her then brushed the ice off and James evaporating the water with magic.

"So, Neil. Care to tell us why you're back so soon?" Earlene asked.

"My mission was to find out what happened in the Southern Isles, then return to Arendelle. I found out what happened, and now I'm back." Neil said, still in a monotone.

Earlene, not one to be sassed by anyone, narrowed her eyes at Neil angrily while the rest looked confused at the coldness Neil was radiating. Elsa leaned forward in her chair, "So what happened in the Southern Isles?"

Neil swiveled his eyes over to her. "The Southern Isles was invaded by numerous nations looking to collect upon their debt. King Malek was taken prisoner by one of the nations. The Southern Isles have officially fallen."

 _Disturbing news,_ Elsa thought. _The Southern Isles is a horrible place, but a power vacuum left behind by the fall of a nation is a dangerous thing_. However, Elsa's thoughts were interrupted by James leaning forward and asking, "So what happened to you?"

"I got into an altercation with a group of guards from one of the nations that thought I was with the Southern Isles." Neil droned out. "If you will excuse me, I should attend to my injuries."

Without so much as a second glance at any of the room's occupants, Neil walked straight out of the room. The remaining people looked confusedly at each other, except for Earlene who was still glaring after Neil.

Wanting to get over that awkward situation, Elsa turned to James. "So did you find out why your eyes turned gold?"

"Not in many details. I broke my concentration to rush to the docks, thinking that was the source. But I got some really vague ideas." James explained.

"Like what?"

"Something about someone behind the scenes, something about some people coming to Arendelle. But I don't know if it was a warning or some helpful advice."

"Either way," Andrew interjected catching on to Elsa's idea as Earlene gradually calmed down. "I think it might be wise to get someone to follow Neil. There's something off about him."

James and Elsa nodded in agreement. And the endless clatter of the raindrops on the castle slowly died down and the storm clouds thinned out, they could almost make out the starry night sky.

"Well at least the storm stopped." Elsa commented. "I guess if it doesn't start up again then the festival can begin the day after tomorrow."


	9. Chapter 8

**So school starts next Monday, who's ready for it! That's right. Nobody. Anyways, the next chapter has arrived. Please review, follow, favorite. Tell me what you like, don't like, what you're thinking, how much you freaking hate school...anything. And so, enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **James:**

With a little assistance from Elsa and I, the townsfolk and the resident heroes had been able to clean up after the storm in a very short amount of time. With all that extra time, we were able to recheck all of the decorations and make sure all of the preparations were still in order. Thankfully we didn't have anything to change about them. While the sky remained grey, having never really cleared up, it didn't seem like it was going to rain and so the festival began the following day.

As agreed, a hero had been assigned to follow Neil discreetly. Said hero reported back to me twice during the day between Neil's return and the start of the festival. Both times he had nothing useful to say; Neil had simply stayed in his home, apparently getting the rest needed to help him heal faster. Besides that, the hero had nothing to report; leaving us all still confused as to Neil's strange behavior. But as the start of the Spring Festival approached I had to push that concern to the back of my mind.

Literal months of planning came to a head for the festival. Days of talking and negotiating with the council finally showing some results. The Spring Festival was a week-long affair including musicians, plays, and various celebrations all leading up to a giant city-wide party on the last day. This was all kicked off with a semi-formal dinner in the castle courtyard.

And so I found myself standing next to Elsa just outside of the large oak doors leading out into the courtyard. Elsa wore her iconic ice dress, but in the name of spring she had turned it green and added flowers, much like the dress she wore for Anna's birthday not too long ago. I was wearing comfortably soft shoes, black pants, a warm red shirt, and a long blue hooded cloak lined in golden fabric, and while I did wear a leather sword belt I wasn't wearing my sword in light of the celebration. Elsa and I were patiently waiting for Anna and Kristoff to join us before we officially started the dinner.

As we stood there patiently waiting, seemingly content to remain in silence, Elsa flicked her wrist at me, sending a snowball to puff against my chest. Elsa tried to hide her giggles behind her hand casually. And so, equally as casually, I flicked my wrist back at her, sending a small burst of air back at her. This was something we did every now and then, we council meetings got boring or councilors started bickering amongst themselves, leaving us with nothing to do but still being required to stay and at least pretend to be paying attention. In order to stave off the boredom, Elsa and I had started this little thing were we would mess with each other with our magic trying to get the other to react enough to get a councilor's attention; a small gust of wind straight into Elsa's ear, a freezing cold lump of slushy snow in my boot, things of that sort.

After a few minutes of magically messing with each other, Kristoff managed to show up with Anna in tow just as a pile of snow materialized and dropped on the top of my head. Kristoff raised an eyebrow but graciously didn't mention the snow as I brushed it off, instead saying, "Sorry for taking so long. Are you guys ready?"

Kristoff wore a typical black suit with a red sash that matched with Anna. Anna wore a long dress that had multiple levels of varying colors of red.

"Of course we are!" I said, wrapping an arm around Elsa's waist. I opened the large doors, revealing the inner courtyard of the castle decorated similarly to the rest of the town. Large circular tables were spread out in the stone courtyard with white table cloths. A large, long wooden table sat closer to the large wooden doors leading into the castle. It looked eerily familiar to how the reception area was set up for Elsa's and Anna's weddings.

Not one to be outdone, as I opened the door to the crowd of hundreds waiting to be seated, I sent a tiny spark into Elsa's waist, not enough to hurt, just enough to get her to jump a little bit, letting out a tiny squeak. Elsa glared playfully at me as she waved a hand at a servant, signaling him to start seating the citizens. She whispered to me, "Just so you know, I'm not going to let that slide. Watch yourself, I'll get you eventually."

We both chuckled to ourselves as we took our seats in the middle of the long table, Anna and Kristoff sitting to Elsa's right, and my mom and Informius, who arrived shortly after the rest of us sitting to my left. We all chatted and laughed while we waited for everyone to get seated.

It took a while, but eventually everyone who was present had a seat round one of the many tables. Me and Elsa adjusted the crowns we were constantly forced to wear and stood up to address the seated crowd. Elsa cleared her throat loudly in an effort to gain the crowd's attention, unfortunately the sound of all the small conversations added together to drown out Elsa's call for attention. I chuckled softly, then I clapped my hands together. A bright blue light shone from between my hands for a second or two and what sounded like a thunderclap sounded through the courtyard.

The sudden burst of sound and light caused everyone to jump slightly. I raised my eyebrows inquisitively, "Everyone good now?" A few people around the courtyard laughed and the atmosphere went from surprised and slightly scared to attentive and light hearted. I gestured to Elsa to continue on to what she had wanted to say.

"Thank you all for coming today. I'd love to welcome you all to the first Spring Festival with a full royal family. Speaking of which, I am very pleased to tell you all that we have a special announcement to make." Elsa gestured to her sister. Anna carefully stood up, helped by Kristoff, and brought her swollen stomach into full view. A collective gasp sounded from the crowd, followed immediately by a roaring applause. Elsa raised her hands and calmed the crowd into a happy silence. "Thank you, thank you. And now, with that out of the way, let the feast begin!"

With a wave of my hand, the servants rushed in from all sides carrying giant platters of food. They surged throughout the courtyard, placing platters of tantalizing food on tables, setting down glasses and pitchers of water, wine, and flavored water. For the royal table, the servants places both platters and plates of food for each of us and several more stood at attention on either end of the table waiting for when one of our glasses ran low.

The afternoon was spent eating, drinking, and talking with family and friends. Off to one side of the courtyard I could see Andrew, Earlene and the rest of the Heroes sitting at their own tables that they had pushed together so they could all sit together. I smiled to myself, seeing my kingdom peaceful and happy.

I was glad that I could be a positive influence on Arendelle. Although mostly, I was just thankful that I didn't bring the kingdom tumbling down. I never wanted to be king, true I had purposefully traded places with the now ex-emperor and married Elsa, and while part of the wedding that he planned had been his very own full coronation I planned on renouncing the full throne and accepting the role of king consort. That plan was messed up by grateful citizens unanimously agreed, demanded really, that I be made a full king, and Elsa made no effort to stop it.

After the sun set behind the mountains surrounding the capital city, it was time for the second part of the dinner; the entertainment. I made eye contact with Kai, who was standing off to one side dutifully, and nodded to signal the start. Kai sent a group of servants out into the crowd of tables carrying candles. They set some down on all of the tables then held out the rest throughout the courtyard.

I raised a hand, a dim blue light shining from it, and all the candles the servants were holding were surrounded by a similarly dim blue light and floated up into the air. Before I could light the candles Anna called out for my attention.

"Hey James, do you mind if I light the candles?" Anna asked politely, giving a sheepish smile. Even though Anna practiced her powers over heat and fires every day she rarely got to use them in a helpful manner, although she loved playing with her powers. I gave her a smile and nodded.

Anna squealed in happiness and stood up from the table while I sat down. She took a breath to calm herself and find her center. Then she waves her hands over the courtyard. All the candle wicks around the courtyard magically burst into flames. Anna danced up and down squealing in delight as the citizens politely applauded. Those of us sitting at the royal table grinned broadly at Anna who, out of all of us, loved her powers the most.

Once all of the candles were lit, acrobats flipped in from one side of the courtyard, while a group of musicians marched in from the other side. With a very impressive musical accompaniment, the acrobats flipped and flew across the courtyard. They created towers out of extra chairs then balanced on one hand on top of the tower. They also hopped nimbly from table to table, not moving a single pea out of place while also doing tricks.

The people loved it. They laughed and applauded during minor tricks, during big tricks they would gasp in awe then quickly follow it with roaring applause. After an hour and a half of the display, the acrobats finally took one last bow before calmly walking out of the courtyard in the direction they entered from.

With the entertainment finished, the final part of the dinner began. Everyone stood up from their tables and moved to the edges of the courtyard. I then stood up and waved my arms over the courtyard once more. And once again a blue glow washed over the courtyard this time the tables moved on their own to an indiscrete corner of the courtyard, also the candles on the table and floating in the air floated just a bit higher up and burned a bit brighter illuminating the courtyard a bit better.

The final part of the semi-formal dinner was a dance. Anna quickly leaped up and made a beeline towards the newly cleared dance floor. I offered my arm to Elsa, which she graciously accepted with a smile. Unlike most dances and balls held at Arendelle Castle, the opening night of the Spring Festival was far more casual than formal, therefore when Elsa and I walked onto the dance floor we were joined by everyone, not just Anna and Kristoff.

Thankfully, neither Elsa nor I particularly enjoyed dancing. Even though both Elsa and I were pretty good at dancing. Elsa had grown up being taught the ins and outs of being royal which included dancing, so naturally she was _very_ good, the only problem being her more introverted personality and general shyness. I, on the other hand, was raised as a peasant and therefore didn't receive any such training or instruction. However, at some point in time, I still can't remember, I had instead received some serious martial arts training. Both dancing and martial arts have many similar components, like balance, coordination, and manipulation of the body, and so naturally I was pretty good at dancing. While I'm not as shy as Elsa; dancing or being in front of large crowds still made me feel uncomfortable.

With that in mind, it wasn't surprising for anybody that Elsa and I only had two dances before we politely excused ourselves from the crowd of dancers. We moved off to the side, away from all the people who wanted to keep dancing. We conjured up some chairs and sat down to rest our feet. I wrapped an arm around Elsa's shoulders and she leaned her head onto my shoulder. We smiled contently as we watched everyone dancing.

"You know, you're getting to be not half bad at dancing." Elsa teased with a smirk.

"I'm just glad I'm good enough not to embarrass you." I said.

"Don't be ridiculous, you could never embarrass me." Elsa said with a chuckle. Which earned her a quick kiss from me.

From then, we sat in loving silence watching as the dancers slowly wound down and eventually stopped. Eventually people started making their way to the courtyard's exit, so me and Elsa stood up to address them.

"Thank you all once again for coming tonight, I hope you had an excellent time." I told them loudly. "And with the end of this dinner, so begins this year's Spring Festival."

Elsa, Anna, and I all lifted our hands to the sky simultaneously. And from our hands shot little bolts of magic, red fire from Anna's and two shades of blue from mine and Elsa's. The bolts flew high over the top of the castle before exploding into a cascade of colors and sparks. And we were rewarded with a final round of applause before everyone left to go back home. The Spring Festival had begun.

* * *

 **So the Spring Festival has finally begun. Soon, very soon, disaster will strike and the true plot of this story will set in motion as everyone's lives are either ruined or** **up-heaved...sometimes I can be pretty evil if you didn't know. Once again review, follow, favorite, it makes my heart all warm and fuzzy inside.**

 **RWTalent**


	10. Chapter 9

**Hey guys, I am very sorry about not updating last week. I have just been absolutely swamped with homework and extra curricular stuff. Unfortunately, I can't promise that it won't happen again. However, I can guarantee that I will not let this story go unfinished, I WILL FINISH IT! So please, to make it easier for me to write, along with making me faster, please review, follow, and favorite.**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Elsa:**

"Please please please please!" Anna begged her older sister. The two royal sisters were sitting in the library, Elsa was sitting on a large plush couch with her feet pulled underneath her a good book and even better coffee in hand. Anna was sitting across from Elsa in a love seat, pleading with her sister.

"C'mon Elsa, it's the Spring Festival you can't just spend the entire time in the castle. Let's go do something in town." The princess of Arendelle was desperately trying to convince her sister to get out of the castle, where she had stayed for the last two days. But Elsa was being resilient.

"I'm not going to spend the _entire_ time in the castle, I'm going to the final party in town." Elsa reasoned. She just didn't feel like leaving the comfort and luxury of the castle just yet, especially since she rarely ever got extended breaks from her legal work and didn't want to have to put on her queenly facade once again.

"Well what does James have to say about it? I'm pretty sure he'd want to go out at some point." Anna countered.

"He's just as happy to spend time with me in the castle as he would be out of the castle." Elsa reassured Anna and herself. In fact, James hadn't even woken up yet, a normal occurrence she had found out, if there was nothing important planned for the day James would practically jump at the opportunity to sleep in as much as possible. That morning Elsa had woken up earlier than everyone as always, regardless of the plan for the day. After creating her ice dress and giving James a small kiss, she went down to the kitchen to make herself a cup of coffee.

At that moment James entered the library obviously not fully awake as he shuffled in yawning. Wearing worn comfortable robes with slippers, his brown hair even more messy and unruly than it usually is, and his crown was nowhere to be found. Usually that drove Kai and Gerda crazy who desperately tried to get James to at least look like what they, and the council, thought a king looked like. However after a few heated arguments between the three of them, and a couple of accidentally magically broken mirrors and windows, they came to an agreement; if no foreign representative was present James could leave off the crown for the morning without getting yelled at by Kai and Gerda.

"G'morning you two. What are you talking about?" James slightly slurred, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He shuffled over and sat next to Elsa, putting an arm around her shoulders.

"I was trying to get Elsa to come with me into the town to have some fun, but she's being stubborn." Anna explained, trying to get James on her side. "What do you think she should do?"

For a split second, Elsa could see a slight mischievous glimmer in James' eyes before he quickly suppressed it. "Well, I think that it's very important for sisters to spend time together. Not to mention the fact that Anna will go regardless, and she wouldn't like to go with a group of guards, however if she went with her sister..."

Elsa sighed in defeat and slowly stood up from her seat. "Alright, I guess I can't avoid it. C'mon Anna, let's go."

Anna jump up, as best as she could, and grabbed Elsa's arm. "Yay! Thank you James! C'mon Elsa let's go!"

James stood up along with Anna and followed them to the door to the library. Just before they left the room James grabbed Elsa's arm, which still held the cup of coffee. "Hold up for a second." He then used her arm to twirl her around and into his chest. He then kissed her deeply, actually dipping her backwards slightly. He broke the kiss and spun her back around to her sister who had to put a hand out to stabilize her.

"Have fun you two." James said as he walked back to a couch in the library.

Elsa, still a bit flustered, and Anna started walking down the hallway. It wasn't until they had gotten out of the castle doors and started to make their way into town before Elsa was able to think straight and realize that her cup of coffee was suddenly missing. Upon realizing what James had done, Elsa smiled quietly to herself. And so she walked hand and in hand with her sister and a smile on her face.

Naturally, the town was alive with excitement and jovial citizens. Flowers and people and streamers and colors were all over the place. Somehow, Anna was able to find her way through the giant mob of people dancing and celebrating in the streets. The younger sister dragged her older sister down the streets and eventually stopped them in front of a small jewelry stand.

Anna quickly raked her gaze across the large selection of jewelry and accessories, trying to find as many pieces she liked as she could. Her sister however, took her time looking at each one individually. It took Anna a while but she managed to cut her initial amount of liked jewelry from 50 down to only 15. Elsa's eye however, was only caught by one.

Among the silver pendants and jewel encrusted medallions, she found a very small snowflake-shaped locket bracelet. It was a bluish locket with a small silver chain. The royals decided that they would buy the jewelry and instructed the jeweler to pick up his dues at the castle. And the two quickly walked off, Anna with a full bag of jingling silver, and Elsa with the silver bracelet clasped around her wrist.

"Queen Elsa! Princess Anna!" The sisters were stopped by a group of small children. "Can you do the magic?"

"Absolutely!" Anna readily agreed. Elsa agreed also, if just a bit more reluctantly.

"What would you like to see?" Elsa asked politely, her and Anna kneeling down to the children's level.

"We want an ice castle and fireworks behind it!" The kids shouted in glee.

"Ah, how about something a bit smaller?" Elsa asked. Then she came up with an idea. "Already kids, back up for a second."

Elsa gathered up magic in her hands, causing a cold blue light to emanate from her hands, and waved her hands over a blank stretch of a street. Streams of sparkling blue magic flowed from her hands and swirled around in the middle of the street.

Wherever Elsa's magic swirled around, snow and ice materialized out of thin air and clumped itself on the ground. Elsa focused hard, picturing what she wanted and willing the snow and ice to bend to her thoughts. Eventually, the blue and white magic swirled faster and faster, even obscuring everyone's vision for a moment, before finally revealing what she had created.

The once clear stretch of street was now covered in around three to four feet of snow. Sitting in the snow were two small-scale ice ships flying a pirate flag and an Arendellian flag. Each ship had small "cannons" on both sides, as well as wells and rudders, based on her experience sailing on the accursed ship during James' Primordial Trials. The kids screamed in delight and mobbed the ships, climbing onto the decks and hanging on the ropes.

Elsa gave them a few seconds to get settled on the two ships before gathering more magic to her hands. She called out to the kids, "You better hold on!"

She swirled her hands around, projecting her will towards the ships. The snow under the ships started to froth and swirl, picking the ships up and moving them slowly around in a large circle. The kids screamed in joy once again, and started to pretend they were firing the cannons at the opposite ship.

Elsa turned her head towards her sister and raised an eyebrow questioningly. Anna, predictably, let out a giant, playful grin. She extended her hands towards the two ships, matching her sister. She waited for a few moments, waited for the perfect moment. All the kids on one of the ships, at the same time, shouted "Fire!"

She chose that moment to show off her powers. The muzzle of the cannon flashed, the result of a very small, yet bright, fire courtesy of Anna. Elsa flicked one of her wrists towards the ship that was "fired" at, sending a snowball at the kids. The kids went wild.

The children's fun went on for at least two hours, the kids trading volleys of snow-cannon balls. Eventually, Anna actually got tired from causing numerous small fires. So Elsa improvised; she turned the ships more towards each other causing them to lightly crash together (hurting no one of course). She then formed soft snow weapons that puffed and fell apart once they hit someone. The boarding fight quickly devolved into a full scale snowball war. Elsa let the ice ships turn into large piles of snow and slump down into lumpy mounds.

The two sisters stayed in the square for a while, happily enjoying the children fling snow at each other. Elsa glanced up at the sky, which had turned into many shades of red and blue due to the setting sun. She also noticed that more and more adults were coming out to celebrate and dance and drink, and lit candles and lanterns were placed up high to illuminate the streets.

"Alright, Anna." Elsa finally said, standing up and offering her hand. "I think it's about time for us to go home."

Anna looked like she was about to argue, but a yawn cut her off, defeating her argument. She sighed, "Okay, I guess it is time."

She took her sister's hand to help her up and the royals started walking back towards Arendelle Castle. They weaved their way through the ever present crowds, making good time. When they got to the bridge reaching across the fjord to the outer castle courtyard, Elsa stopped suddenly.

"Elsa, is something wrong?" Anna asked worriedly.

"No, no. I just need a second." Elsa said. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "Anna, I don't want to be queen anymore."

"What do you mean?" Anna asked very confused.

"I don't know. I just don't think I can be queen. I'm tired. Tired of the paperwork, tired of the councilors, and the foreign representatives. I'm just not happy as queen."

"Why don't you and James abdicate then?" Anna asked, straight to the point.

"Because I don't want you to have to do it just because I don't want to." Elsa admitted.

"Elsa. It doesn't matter. If you're unhappy with being queen, I'll take over. I'd do anything for you."

"Trust me Anna, you don't want to do that." Elsa took her sister's hands. "But thank you for offering. I'll just have to find a different way."

"Alright, I won't push you. But keep it in mind." Anna glanced down at Elsa's new snowflake locket bracelet. "Do you know what you're going to put in there?"

Elsa took her hands back and opened the locket to look at the blank insides. She didn't even have to think that long to figure out what she wanted to put in there. She focused for a moment, creating small ice "paintings" in the lockets, with different shades of ice to add all the colors. One the left side, a miniature family portrait; Elsa and James sitting together on Sven, Elsa holding Olaf, and Anna and Kristoff standing next to Sven arm in arm. One the right side she put a more specific portrait; a close up of James carrying Elsa in his arms, like he did so long ago after freeing her from dark magic, focusing on their faces, their eyes showing immense and inarguable love for each other.

"Ah, how nice." Anna cooed.

With Anna on one arm, her newly decorated locket on the other, and James' gift of a miniature star necklace around her neck, she walked back to the castle feeling surrounded by those who love her.


	11. Chapter 10

**Hey guys, what's up? Luckily, or unluckily, I got pretty sick last night and was able to write pretty much this whole chapter. I'd like to thank everyone who has followed, favorited (me or this story), and reviewed, you guys are awesome. And for those of you who haven't I strongly encourage it, it's fun and it gets me to write both faster and better. Anyways, please enjoy. If you do please review, follow, and favorite.**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **James:**

"It seems that the Southern Isles refugees have settled in quite well. As a matter of fact, some of them brought over valuables and tradable goods and the influx of trade has bumped up our economy." The lead economic councilor informed me happily. Despite his initial disdain towards the giant increase in mouths to feed, he was starting to see them as more of an opportunity.

I feigned interest, really only listening for the most important details, while Elsa sitting next to me was actually paying attention, as per a turn-base arrangement between us. So she continued the conversation along as I pretended to pay attention but in reality, simply stared out of the window.

It was the final day of the Spring Festival and the parties in the street were in full swing. Tonight would be the last event of the Festival, a formal dinner/dance of dance. After Elsa had gone out with the castle, she and I had gone out a few more times to take part in the merriment. The only problem being that every time we came back to the castle, it was much more harder to actually re-enter and face the role of monarchs again.

"It's settled then," a councilor announced, unfortunately drawing my attention back to the matters at hand. "we'll cut our budgets by five percent, and redirect two percent of the remainder for the development of our infrastructure."

I groaned internally. I was indescribably grateful that _I_ was not the one that had to listen to that entire conversation. However, judging from several small indicators on Elsa's face gave away the fact that she was very _un_ grateful that she was having to listen to it. But she struggled through and forced a smile on her face. "Thank you councilor. And I believe that concludes our meeting."

All the councilors stood up and made towards the door while Elsa and I hung back. Once the final councilor left the room and the door closed firmly behind them, both of us slumped in our seats. We both leaned against each other, using that to stay up instead of holding ourselves up. We sighed simultaneously.

"Thank god that meeting is over." I managed to say. "I was completely bored, and I wasn't even paying attention."

"Thank god indeed." Elsa replied, looking over at me with a sly smile. "However... we don't have anything planned for the next few hours."

I smiled back, turning to her and cupping the side of her face. Our lips got within an inch of each other before the council room doors burst open. We quickly separated and faced our new visitor, who turned out to be Olaf, who came waddling in.

"Olaf," Elsa began, I could clearly hear the irritation just beneath the surface of her voice. "What a surprise. What are you doing here?"

"Anna and Kristoff sent me! They wanted to know if your meeting had finished!" Olaf said.

"And do they _need_ anything?" Elsa asked, although the emotion in her voice made it more like a demand than a question. Olaf, being as clueless as he was, didn't even recognize it.

"They said that they wanted to talk to you about something." Olaf told us.

"Thank you for telling us Olaf." Elsa said, breathing out of her nose angrily. At that Olaf merrily skipped out of the room. She turned to me. "They'll be waiting for us."

We both stood up and started towards the door. I wrapped an arm around her shoulders to try to calm her down on our way through the castle. It took a while, but we found Anna and Kristoff sitting in the dining hall. Anna quickly grabbed Elsa and pulled her down into the adjacent seat, they immediately started talking quickly and in hushed voices.

Suddenly standing alone I went over and sat in the seat next to Kristoff. It only took two seconds of Kristoff and I trying to keep up with the sisters' conversation for us both to grow tired of it. Kristoff confidently pulled a large bottle of alcohol and two glasses from under the table, handing and glass to me and keeping the other.

"So what have you been up to today?" Kristoff asked me, filling both of our glasses. To be able to answer that question, I had to take a long drink of the surprisingly spicy alcohol.

"Ugh, it's been absolutely horrible. We've been stuck in that stupid council room for hours! And we covered _nothing_ interesting!" I complained. "If Elsa wasn't there with me, I would probably would've _freaked_ out and blown something up."

At the sound of her name, Elsa glanced over and sent a smile my way. Then she went back to talking to her sister. "But you probably don't want to hear about infrastructure and budgets." I said, taking another sip of water. "What have you two been up to today?"

"We took a long walk through town, bought and consumed a few pounds of chocolate. And Anna thought of something that she needed to ask Elsa, something that has to do with the refugees." He explained. "And we went with Sven around a mountain trail."

"Ugh, what I wouldn't give to have done that instead."

"Well I don't think there's any problem with that. James," Elsa said, looking over at me. She gave a particularly pointed glance at my nearly empty wine glass. "Is there any reason you can think of that the refugees can't join in the dance?"

"Can't think of one off the top of my head. As long as they have something to wear."

"See, there you go." Elsa told Anna, apparently answering her sister's question. "You know what, I bet most of them don't even know what to wear. And since James and I will be stuck in the castle all day, you're the only person I trust enough to help them."

Elsa knew her sister would pick up on the undertones of that statement, because no one in the castle was anywhere near dumb enough to believe Anna wasn't intelligent. And as sure as the rising sun, Anna caught the undertones and glanced between me and Elsa. While she did enjoy helping people and fashion was a particularly liked hobby, she must've seen something in our eyes to know that we wanted some time to ourselves with absolutely nothing to do with the kingdom.

Anna, kind hearted as usual, smiled at us. "Of course I'll help. You two enjoy your time in the castle! C'mon Kristoff!"

Anna then proceeded to stand up and practically drag her husband out of the room. Elsa reached across the table and picked up the bottle, pouring herself a glass she created with ice and refilling my glass. We both heartily downed our drinks before standing and quickly making our way out of the dining hall and up to our room.

Just outside the door, I turned Elsa around and captured her lips with mine. Using one hand to press her up against my body as we pushed through the door, I closed the door behind us. Elsa flicked a hand at the door, coating it in ice and sealed it shut.

I picked her up by the waist and set her down on her back on our bed. I quickly slipped my shirt off as Elsa wrapped her legs around my waist. I recaptured her lips and started gliding my hands up and down Elsa's sides, using a little bit of magic to make the ice of her dress disappear. Elsa ran her fingers into my hair as if to deepen the already heated kiss.

A sudden knock on our door made us immediately stop what we were doing and look at the door. "Your Majesties, I was told to make sure you knew the Festival will be starting soon and to tell you that there is someone in the throne room that wishes to talk with you." Gerda's voice sounded through the door.

I dropped my head into the bed and let out a muffled groan. Elsa took a second to take a deep breath before responding, "Thank you, Gerda! I'll be down in just a moment!"

We both laid there for a moment, regretting our societal positions. Elsa lightly tapped me on the shoulder and said, "I'm sorry James, I'll take care of whoever needs help. You get ready for the festival."

I stood up, helping Elsa up as well. Elsa stood up on her toes and gave me one last deep kiss before gracefully gliding out of our room. I remained standing there for a few moments, just taking in the irony of the situation; arguably the most powerful man in Arendelle, or possibly the entire North, and I couldn't even share an intimate moment with my wife.

After a while I came to terms with that fact, besides; I couldn't be king forever, it was very possible that I could live forever and I know for a fact that I would not be king for longer than a normal lifetime. So with that in mind I was able to get moving and get ready for the dance, despite how much I dragged my feet.

After an hour or two, I was relaxing in a chair in my room willing a small ball of blue light to fly around the room. The door swung open to reveal an exhausted and irritable Elsa. She blew into the room and entered the adjourning bathroom. She left tiny snowflakes floating in the air where she went. I waved a hand and made the snowflakes disappear.

"So, how did it go?" I asked pleasantly.

"You know I love Arendelle. And I love everyone in it." Elsa started to say as she quickly got herself ready. "But sometimes they can _seriously_ get on my nerves. So that person that wanted to talk to us, really just came to file a complaint about one of the vendors. I was trying to tell him that I'm not the person that needs to be told when the vendor he was complaining about burst in uninvited and the two of them started arguing and wouldn't listen to anyone else."

"So how did you solve the problem?"

"They wouldn't listen to me, and I wasn't going to freeze them, so I eventually had to call the guards in on them. They were actually physically dragged out of the castle."

"Glad I wasn't there, I might have actually thrown them out myself." I said as Elsa walked out of the bathroom in a new outfit and her hair and makeup redone.

She had modified her usual ice dress for the spring events. She had slightly shorted the dress so that it fell to her upper calves, as well as the see through sleeves were shortened to reach only a few inches down from her shoulders. Instead of ice blue, the dress was a light green. Her hair was done in its typical braid, but the usual snowflakes that dusted her hair where replaced by a few flowers. She wore comfortable ice shoes instead of ice heels, she had taken quite a liking to them ever since she first wore them during my trials. And she had also wrapped around her waist a sash the same shade of light blue that her magic was along with her newly purchased bracelet and her ever present star necklace.

Elsa's sash had the loose ends tucked neatly away, so it looked like a continuous piece of fabric, I on the other hand didn't do the same. I was wearing the typical suit for men of the time. Black jacket, black pants and a white shirt. I also wore, instead of the typical black tie of a usual suit, I wore a simple blue crystal with a leather cord. My sash was a darker shade of blue than Elsa's, and I had the two ends of the sash that came after the knot dangling off to one side.

"Well, how do I look?" Elsa asked, swinging left and right making the bottom of her dress fan out.

I stepped up close to Elsa and pulled her close. "You look beautiful. But then again you always do."

I gave her a chaste kiss before I gestured to the door. "Are you ready?"

"Ugh. I'm going to have to." She said. She wrapped an arm around my lower back and I wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

Together we walked out of the room, through the castle, and out into the courtyard. In the courtyard was a large space cleared for the dancing and multiple tables set out with drinks and food. Lines running from the top of the castle wall to upper levels of the castle held paper lanterns that lit up the dance floor very well even in the fading sunlight. All the free space around the dance floor and between the tables was crowded with finely dress people.

Waiting outside the castle doors were Anna and Kristoff. Kristoff looked very uncomfortable in his standard suit, he absolutely hated social events; only going to them if Anna begged him. Anna however looked like a fish in water, as if she could breath better in crowds. However, she wasn't paying much attention to anyone in particular. I could see her eyes methodically search through the large crowds.

"What are you looking for?" I asked her when Elsa and I walked up to the other pair.

"I'm looking for Andrew." Anna said, not stopping her searching. "I've got unfinished business with him."

"You're really not going to let him enjoy tonight?" Elsa asked.

"Nope." Anna said plainly.

A band, tucked away somewhere, struck up a simple waltz. Being the King and Queen, Elsa and I had the "honor" of first dance. So I took Elsa out onto the dance floor and led her through a very simple waltz. While I'm not necessarily bad at dancing, combat training gives excellent results to footwork and balance, I prefer doing a simple waltz as opposed to more advanced ones because the simples ones are always shorter in length.

Once we had finished, the crowds clapped and applauded more out of courtesy than anything else. Then everyone flooded the dance floor, led by Anna dragging poor Kristoff along. Elsa and I retreated to the outskirts of the party, not being nearly the social butterflies as Anna. I grabbed a glass of champagne for both of us before leaning back against a wall, Elsa taking her glass and leaning back against my chest. We sipped our drinks and watched everyone's merrymaking.

After a moment, Elsa said to me, "You know, as much as I don't like having big parties, I think this might have been worth it."

"Well then maybe we should have another one next year." I suggested.

Elsa giggled to herself. "Don't be mistaken, I'm happy tonight's the last night. I just think in retrospect, this week has been pretty good."

"Good, we're in agreement." I laughed. Looking out over the happy dancing faces, I made another decision. "C'mon Elsa, one last dance. One last one and we're taking a well deserved week off."

* * *

 **So, no action (pun intended) in this chapter but those of you who miss the action of the first story have no fear, the next chapter is when it all hits the fan. So please stay tuned, review, follow, favorite and have a wonderful day.**

 **RWTalent**


	12. Chapter 11

**Guess who it is! That's right, I'm still here! I do apologize for the prolonged wait, but again with the whole school encroaching on my life and limiting my free time down to nothing. But I said I was going to finish this story and by damn, that's what I'm going to do! So please; follow, favorite, and write a review. Trust me, I'm going to need it as projects and college applications start demanding my life from me.**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Andrew**

Andrew didn't swarm the dance floor like the rest of the people did. That's probably why princess Anna was able to find him so quickly. He stayed towards the back of the dance not really being the type for any kind of formal dance. With drink in hand, Andrew half snuck around the courtyard trying not to be spotted by either Anna or the women she had introduced him to.

A little ray of light shone in his eye, he looked over and spotted James leaning on a castle wall with Elsa leaning on him, both happily looking over their subjects. Andrew started making his way towards the royal couple, usually he wouldn't think of intruding on an obviously more intimate moment but he knew they would at least try to protect him from Anna.

Just before he was able to get their attention, they got up from the wall and made their way straight to the dance floor. Andrew jumped when a hand grabbed his shoulder and spun him around. Instead of finding Anna behind him, he was surprised to find it was Earlene instead, and wearing a fancy dress to boot.

Her black hair had a bun in the back with what was left draped over the back of her shoulders. Her off the shoulder emerald dress shimmered and sparkled in the dying sunlight and the hanging lanterns. Despite what many people would find unattractive, her well toned, slightly muscular, arms and legs looked quite good in the dress.

"Andrew, thank god I found you. I think princess Anna is going to try something soon." Earlene informed him. "Do you have a plan?"

"Uhm...not really."

Earlene glanced around, scanning the crowds. She must've seen Anna moving towards them, because Andrew saw her tense up before grabbing his arm and dragging him towards the crowd on the dance floor. They blended in with the thick crowd, essentially hiding from direct sight, a little trick James had developed for walking around Arendelle without attracting attention.

A few seconds later Andrew saw Anna walk up to where they were standing, leading a man and a woman, looking around irritably. It took her a moment, but somehow she was able to pick them out of the dancers, maybe James had taught her a counter to the blending trick. She grabbed the two strangers and started to drag them towards the two Heroes. In response, the two quickly dashed through the crowd, trying to break her line of sight. They eventually were able to make their way all the way around the dance floor then re-enter the dance floor crowd.

"How did she find us?" Andrew asked.

"We're just standing among everyone, we're standing out. We need to dance." Earlene said decisively.

"I'm sorry...what?" he asked. Andrew had never seen Earlene as someone who danced, or even took the time to learn how to dance.

"I'm not _just_ a hero, Andrew." Earlene said sternly, catching the incredulity in Andrew's voice. She glanced over his shoulder, spotting Anna and the two she was dragging along. "You know what, there's no time. Let's dance."

Before he could respond, Earlene dragged him by his arm deeper into the crowd and placed one of his hands on her slim waist and held the other while placing her hand on his shoulder. And before he knew it, the two heroes were dancing right along with the crowd. Having been forced to do countless dance routines while growing up in Britain, his natural reflexes kicked in and helped guide both him and Earlene.

As they danced around the courtyard, Andrew noticed how well Earlene actually danced, even though no one had ever seen her practice. They also passed James and Elsa who, strangely enough, seemed to be having a good time dancing. And even more strangely, he and Earlene seemed to be as well.

"So, how was your day?" Earlene asked awkwardly.

Andrew gave Earlene a look. "I thought pleasantries bored you."

"Well...I thought I should at least give it a try. But I'm still really bad at it."

"No one's good at it. I think that's the point."

After a pause, Earlene asked, "How angry do you think we made them?"

Twirling around, Andrew caught a sight of the trio they had been running from. Both the man and the woman looked very angry. And in between them, Anna stood there seeming... _smug?_ Andrew though incredulously.

"The two Anna wanted to pair us up with are angry. But Anna looks like she thinks she won." He said. Earlene, who was quite competitive, frowned, not liking to think she had been outmaneuvered.

Andrew spotted a break in the crowd around them leading to a less populated and out of the way side of the courtyard. He also noticed that Anna had turned to the man and woman and was having a heated conversation, neither of the strangers looked very happy about it either.

"This way," Andrew said, breaking step and dragging Earlene through the break.

Once they made it to the more reclusive spot, they relaxed slightly, picking up a pair of drinks. They watched the crowd dance, noticing that James and Elsa were still out there and didn't look to be stopping anytime soon.

They sipped their drinks in companionable silence, trying unsuccessfully to think of something to say. They were both startled by someone clearing their throat directly behind them. They whipped around and found, to their horror, that Anna was the one standing behind them.

"Very clever you guys." Anna said, slightly irritated but with a hint of humor. "Got them to give up without really doing anything."

"Perhaps you should not try to set us up with people." Earlene suggested.

"Eh, maybe." She replied. "You two looked good dancing out there."

"Oh, well, uh-" Andrew started awkward, but was interrupted when Earlene suddenly grabbed his arm.

Earlene had started staring off into space, and her eyes lost all focus. He had seen this before, Earlene was very good at certain subtle types of magic, including earth magic and divination. Whenever she's doing the later one, she gets a glazed over look in her eyes.

"Princess Anna, you need to get into the castle. Right now." Earlene said, suddenly very serious.

"What? Why? What's going on?" Anna asked, serious as well.

"Earlene, what do you see?" Andrew asked.

"I don't know, but someone's coming. And they're not here to celebrate." Earlene said, grabbing hold of Anna's arm and dragging her back towards the castle. "Stop talking, start moving."

"Wait, we have to get everyone else!" Anna protested.

"We'll get Kristoff on the way. Andrew, get James and Elsa." Earlene said, pushing through the crowds as fast as she could.

Without a moment's hesitation Andrew turned towards where he last saw James and Elsa. He wasn't polite about it either, he pushed and shoved his way through everyone. Andrew was getting more and more worried, as soon as Earlene had sensed danger he had sent out his own magical senses to try to find danger. While his senses weren't as good as James', if James wasn't actually looking for danger then he wouldn't notice until the danger was right in front of him. And he was starting to get signs of danger approaching fast. Andrew finally found James and Elsa standing close together in the middle of the crowd. Andrew pushed and shoved his way over to the pair.

"Your Majesties, you need to get inside quickly, something's coming." Andrew told them.

For a moment, James frowned in concentration searching for the danger, then his eyes shot open in alertness. "They're here. Get ready for a fight."

James and Elsa turned to face the walls, adopting a deeper stance; more like a fighting stance but not enough to be very obvious. Andrew turned to speak to the crowds, but something on top of the walls caught his attention. Standing on top of walls was a solitary figure. This figure was dressed in all black, with a tight hood and a scarf to block out his face, around his waist was numerous weapons including a sword, a knife, and some strange tube of sorts. Then a second one appeared, then a third, then a fourth, more and more appeared on the top of the castle's walls.

"Get to cover!" Andrew yelled, getting in a fighting stance.

People, finally noticing the threat, scrambled around the courtyard, running in different directions to try to find cover. The figures on the walls jumped down into the courtyard, drawing their swords, then charged forward. Andrew and James made gestures toward the castle, then sunk into a fighting stance.

As the figures rushed forwards, the three Arendellians starting using magic. Elsa covered the floor they were running over in slick ice and low barriers to trip them up. Andrew fired blasts of pure force, knocking those it hit backwards. And James fired blasts of blue lightning that Andrew knew were painful but not lethal. The magic blasts knocked down countless of the attackers, but for everyone they crippled or knocked over, two more would take their place in the charge.

For whatever reason, while Andrew and Elsa were dealing with an almost overwhelming amount of people each, the majority of them were springing straight towards James. Luckily, as the three of them were gradually forced back under the onslaught, three crashes sounded from the windows of the castle. Andrew caught his two thin swords and James caught his signature blue sword. And the two men switched from magic to physical combat.

Andrew was good, and he knew he was good. Every time one of the sword wielding men stepped up to take a swing at him, Andrew quickly dispatched him and moved on to one or two that were moving past him. Elsa was also very skilled, but stayed behind the two men, firing blasts of ice past them. James was another story. With sword in hand, James was a blur, a nightmare, an avenging angel, and a force of nature all rolled into one. Even with the majority of the attackers, James moved and countered and fought like a fish moves through water.

The surge of the foreign warriors ground to a halt. For a second Andrew had a second to observe the state of the courtyard past the cloaked people. The Heroes who had been laughing and having fun separately had formed a protective line around the partiers who had joined together in a corner of the courtyard. Slowly, amazingly, Andrew, James, and Elsa started pushing back. The battle line started moving back towards the walls.

The fight was turning for the better. That is, until Andrew and James heard a cry out from behind them. The fight stopped as the men spun around to see what was going on. Elsa had fallen to her knees, clutching at her head. Andrew could feel something odd, a stirring of strange, ancient, and powerful magic. Elsa started to glow a combination of blue and gold, brighter and brighter, until she was too bright to look at directly. She lit up the whole courtyard as bright as it was in the most direct sunlight, and then even brighter.

Despite this, without hesitation, James ran straight for her, leaving a wall of blinded people behind him. As he got closer to his wife, he became just a small silhouette rushing towards an angry blue and gold sun. As he reached Elsa, a bright flash shone from her, an instant later Elsa and the light was gone. James was left standing in a clear space, mouth agape staring at a small silver circle in his hand.

Suddenly, a sharp pain shot through the back of Andrew's head, bringing him all the way to the ground. He looked through blurry vision as black masses swarmed towards his king, who brought a hand up to his neck as he too sunk down to the ground. A random foot caught the back of Andrew's head, forcing him to unconsciousness.

* * *

 **Speaking about colleges and after school stuff, what do you guys/girls like to do? I'm actually really interested in the kind of people that read my stuff. Leave it, or anything really, in a review and I promise I'll answer it; along with any questions or other comments. Thanks!**

 **RWTalent**


	13. Chapter 12

**Haha! Another chapter in a reasonable amount of time! Take _that_ IB program! Anyways, I hope you enjoy this one, it's going to be quite the shock (Ever since the wedding of the Primordial Prince I find I really like writing little twists). If you like the chapter, and the story in general, please review saying you like it (or really anything, I like hearing from you), follow, and favorite. Enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Elsa:**

I woke up lying on the ground. Pushing myself up, I could see I had woken up in a dead forest. What was mostly spaced around the dead, nutrient-less dirt were decaying stumps. What plants were still standing, were withered and blackened. There weren't even any birds flying through the air. I was pretty sure I was the only living being in the forest.

I stood up and glanced at what I was wearing. A cute, comfortable green dress with a blue sash, covered with the colorless dirt around her, and somehow looked more lumpy than what I thought dresses should look like. My bare, slightly damp feet, dug into the dirt. A veil of platinum blonde hair feel over my eyes. I brushed it back with my hands, and found a lot more in a loose, messy braid.

After fixing my hair back in a tight braid, and looking around unsuccessfully for my missing shoes, I realized I was missing something else. I knew what a dress looked like, I knew how to walk and talk, and I even knew that my name was Elsa Alexander. But besides basic common knowledge, I didn't remember anything. No matter how hard I thought or pushed my mind, I couldn't remember anything beyond that.

Fear started bubbling up in my stomach, but I suppressed it as if on reflex. I took a deep breath, and forced myself to think. If I stayed where I was, there was almost no chance anyone would go for a casual walk through a dead forest and find here. So I decided to choose a direction, and start walking.

As I found, without shoes the rocks on the ground poked painfully into the bottom of my feet. As I was walking, I stepped on a large and crumbling rock which gave way as soon as I had put my weight on top of it. Without the firm footing, I fell forward, catching myself on one of the thin blackened tree corpses.

A blue light flashed from my hand and a layer of frost quickly spread over the surface of the tree crackling and crunching as it did so. I stayed frozen, staring open-mouthed at the now frozen tree. I took my hand off and stared at it as well. The blue of the ice, I noticed, was the same color as the sash around my waist.

Looking at my outfit, I started to connect the dots. I flicked my hand at the outfit, and blue light drifted from my hand, swirling over my outfit. The deformations corrected themselves, the dress morphing and changing as the light past. As the light reached my feet, soft shoes made of ice formed around them.

I knew the outfit was cold, but it didn't bother me. As a matter of fact, it felt comfortable, and just _right_. Something about the ice resonated with me on a base, animalistic level. Regardless, the outfit wasn't fit for travel. So with a smirk, I went to work on my outfit.

After a bit of working, I had managed to redress myself without having to really change. I had replaced the dress with something more comfortable and functional. I created brown, formfitting pants, along with a more loose-fitting white blouse, and I had changed my shoes slightly to make them more suitable for walking. I kept the sash, for some reason I felt a connection to it, something I couldn't quite put my finger on, but I had taken the loose ends and un-tucked them, leaving them dangling off the left side of her hip.

I had also found something curious that I hadn't noticed before; a small glass sphere on a silver chain around my neck. Inside the sphere was a small bright star, glowing warmly and slightly warming whatever skin I placed on the glass. Like the sash, I felt a connection beyond remembering to it, except exponentially stronger.

I tucked the necklace into my shirt, deciding it best that something I felt so valuable shouldn't be advertised in a place like this. And with that I restarted my trek through the "forest". It took a few hours, or what seemed like hours; it was difficult to tell time with the sky constantly grey and overcast, but when the sky darkened I finally came across a city.

It was a huge city with an even larger castle. The problem was that the city was in ruins. The buildings had huge holes in them, the streets were filled with rubble and trash, and nothing in the city seemed to move. The city as a whole seemed dead or deserted.

I fixed the city with a skeptical stare. While I wasn't hungry or thirsty at the moment, I knew I would need food and supplies eventually. But I didn't trust the city, something about it set me on edge, as if something was off with the city. And I really didn't like how I couldn't see anyone.

I was about to figure out which direction would most likely lead me to a different city when a bright red light flashed from the castle. I stared at the castle, wondering if I had actually seen a red light. Looking closer I could see the silhouettes of winged creatures flying around the castle and occasionally swooping at it. Another red light flashed and one of the silhouettes was suddenly falling out of the sky.

Despite common sense telling me to run the opposite direction, curiosity get the best of me, and I slowly crept forward, keeping to the shadows of the ruined buildings. As I got closer, I could hear the huge clap of thunder that sounded with every flash of red light. One of the creatures landed just in front of me, but I still didn't get a good look at it; an entire side of it was blackened and smoking, slightly glowing red. The stench of burning flesh rose off of the carcass, I held my breath as I moved on, giving the body a wide birth.

I finally made it directly under the castle. It was designed like the classic European ones, four walls and four cylindrical towers at each of the walls' corners. On each of the four walls was a drawbridge that would reach across a moat wrapping around the castle. In the waters of the moat I could see countless more dead and scorched creatures. One of the drawbridges was down, conveniently the one closest to me.

A high pitched screech behind me made me jump, one of those black creatures was flying directly at me in a black blur. Throwing a hand towards it a wall of blue light crystallized into ice, stopping the creature and pushing it back a good fifty feet. But the creature smashed right through it and was once again streaking after me. I threw up another wall of ice and started sprinting across the drawbridge.

Dozens more of the creatures screeched and flew at me. I made it through the gate of the castle, and turned around. I threw my hands at the gateway, filling it all the way up with blue light that solidified into ice blocking the entire gateway.

 _Thuds_ and _cracks_ sounded from the wall as the creatures collided with the barrier. Then a quick scraping and scratching as they tried to claw their way through the ice. I back away from the wall of ice, and my heart sank when I heard one of the creature's screeches...directly behind me.

I whipped around to find one crouched, ready to pounce, five long strides away. To say the thing was ugly would be an understatement. It's tar-colored leathery skin was stretched tight over its stringy muscles and sharp, angular bones. It had the facial structure of a wolf, slightly elongated, slobbering through its enormous, pointed teeth. It had wings like a bat, except with talons on the ends. Its legs were like a birds, its knees and ankles bent in different angles that also had long talons with disturbing brown stains on them. Its angry, glowing red eyes were sizing me up.

I sunk into a lower stance, ready to move at a moment's notice, but they way I had seen these things move I probably wasn't going to be fast enough. And my chances of survival sank further when a huge _boom_ sounded from behind me as the other creatures finally broke through the wall of ice as quickly surrounded me.

My hands started to shake and cold mist started flowing out of her hands nervously. Frost crackled as it spread out from my feet as I grew more and more frightened. The creatures growled in unison, causing the hairs on my neck to stand on end. They all got ready to pounce at once, and I deeply regretted ever taking a single step into that stupid city.

The creatures all leapt towards me as once. I created a dome of thick ice around me that absorbed the blow, but trapped me as they started clawing through it. A hole opened up in front of me, showing me the crazed face of one of the creatures as it leaned through the hole to bite me. I started to panic and tried to get as far away from its maw as I could, pushing my back up against the dome.

Just as it was about to dig its teeth into my arm or face, a crimson light flashed over me, blinding me. I could feel a wave of pure force wash over me, the only thing protecting me from it was the dome, which cracked all over in a spider web pattern. The creature in front of me and all the creatures trying to break in to me were thrown bodily, head over heels, back into the gateway.

As surprised as I was, I didn't think to break myself out of the dome, so I was only able to see what happened next through the hole the creature had clawed out. A very tall man with pure white hair wearing flowing black and red robes strode into view, with his back facing me. The air around him shimming and swayed with power with a slight red tint.

The creatures got back their claws and talons, regaining their footing. They fixed him with a glare that could kill. In a flurry of leathery darkness all of the creatures threw themselves at the man at once. In response the man raised both hands and poured red light from them. The light was so bright, I had to shield my eyes, and even then the light made its way to my eyes.

The light slowly faded away, then it flashed up to a lesser degree and the ice dome around her slowly disintegrated. Bright red spots kept popping up in my vision, blocking my view of the man as he grabbed my arm and lifted me to my feet.

"Oh _thank god_ you're okay. I thought I had lost you." The man said, pulling me into an oddly familiar embrace.

From the embrace I could see the charred, barely recognizable remains of the creatures, all still sizzling, one even had a small red flame burning on it. The gateway had darkened burn marks all across the stones and there wasn't even a trace of the remains of my ice wall. And the drawbridge was charred and smoking.

The man broke the embrace and held me at an arm's length. After my vision had cleared up I was able to get my first look at him. His face was symmetrical, with smooth, pleasing angles and a strong chin. His nose looked crooked, like it had been broken before and he had the slightest of scruff growing on his face. For whatever reason, when I saw him the idea of a fairy-tail "Prince Charming" came to mind. But the most interesting of his features was his eyes. They were a deep shade of green, familiar, and yet slightly alien to me. I could decide what shade of green they were; either algae plagued pond or calm and serene forest.

"I-I'm sorry," I said, deciding to be honest. "I don't remember who you are."

His face showed a hint of amusement in the form of a slight smile full of hidden secret meanings. "Why, Elsa, don't you remember? I'm Damien Alexander, King of the Southern Isles. I'm your husband."

* * *

 **Mwahaha! *Evil smile emoji* Like I said, this story's going to be more intense. So, did I get any of you, or are you like some people who read my last story and were able to guess all my twists? Please review, follow, and favorite!**

 **silversurfer: Thank you, I'm glad you like my last story since I did it kind of on a whim. I hope I got this chapter out fast enough for you and hopefully I don't take _too_ long from now on. **

**: omg indeed, my friend. I did say things were going to go down, I can't wait to see how you'll react to all the little twists and fight I have in store.**

 **Thanks for reading! Have a nice weekend, you've earned it!**

 **RWTalent**


	14. Chapter 13

**Alright, so we've covered what happened to Elsa after the attack. Now let's learn what happened to Andrew afterwards. I think this'll be fun, I'm writing three different story lines at the same time, a step up from last story which had around two at most. Anyways, if you enjoyed reading please leave a review, follow, or favorite.**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Andrew:**

Slowly, Andrew returned to consciousness. With an effort, he forced his eyes open and managed to blink the blurriness out of his vision. When he did, he found he looked around in confusion, finding himself in a strange room that wasn't his own. Then the memory of what had happened at the dance came flooding back to him. And with the memory came a dozen aches, pains, and minor injuries all across his body, the suddenness of it all caused him to grunt in pain.

"Oh thank goodness, you're awake." A soft voice said from beside him.

Andrew turned his head to find Earlene sitting in a chair next to the bed he was lying in. He guessed he was in a spare room of Arendelle Castle. There was a small desk and a standard looking wooden dresser. A window to his right looked out over the fjord and had a lovely view of the mountains. And he was wearing a clean brown shirt and what felt like pajama pants underneath a pile of warm quilts. Earlene was wearing a comfortable, emerald green robe and had a concerned look on her face.

"How are you feeling?" Earlene asked, picking up a tray with water and a small bowl of what smelled like chicken soup. She placed it over Andrew's lap and helped him to sit up.

"Like I just got my butt handed to me by an elephant." He said, coughing a bit in the process.

"Makes sense. I found you knocked out on the ground, dragged you here, and got a doctor for you. It looked like they had trampled you to get to James and Elsa. Speaking of which, do you remember what happened?"

"I don't really know. Everything was going our way, they couldn't even touch us. Then, something happened, Elsa started to glow really bright gold and blue. James quit fighting to help her, but she disappeared before he could get to her. Then they swarmed us, and one of them kicked me in the head. I don't know what happened after that." Andrew recounted as he partook of his meal, "Where's James? We have to go after Elsa."

Earlene looked down at the floor. Andrew noticed and asked, "Hey, what's that for? Where's James? What happened?"

"I don't know." She admitted softly. "When I went back out, James was gone, and you were unconscious. Anna and the search team have been trying to figure out what happened, but they haven't found anything. We had hoped he had gotten away and you had known."

"Wait...search team? How long have I lying here?" He asked, suddenly very worried.

"A week. You've been lying there for a week." She said.

"A week?!" Andrew pushed the cleared tray and tried to stand up. He was only able to when Earlene stood and helped him. "I need to get moving, do something."

Earlene, knowing that she wouldn't be able to convince him otherwise, helped him out the door and down the hall. After walking down a few hallways, Andrew realized Earlene was leading him to the royal study, where Elsa and James worked. But if both Elsa and James were missing, why were they walking to the royal study? Instead of asking, Andrew simply resigned himself to finding out once he got there. When he and Earlene finally arrived, she pushed the door open gently and revealed the study in a state of disaster.

The orderly shelves of books and papers were now cluttered and had some contents thrown all across the room. The once carefully balanced piles of papers and documents that James and Elsa had been meticulously going through were knocked over and strewn around the room as well. Half empty cups and glasses and plates that had half eaten meals were placed on shelves and tables around the room. Sitting in the big, throne-like, chair behind the desk was a very disheveled looking Anna.

Her braids were frayed and messy. She had large, dark circles under reddened, stress-filled eyes. And while she was wearing a clean looking green dress, it was wrinkled and messed up, with a few fresh coffee stains. And more importantly, she didn't have a smile on her face as she sat at the desk, something that was almost inconceivable a week before.

Anna looked up, a smile shadow of a smile showed on her face as she rose to greet them. "Oh, Andrew you're up. Awesome, you can help Kristoff."

"Help Kristoff?" Andrew asked. "What's happened since the dance?"

Anna's expression fell back to its stressed and sad state. "The council can't wait for us to find Elsa and James, so they made me temporary queen. Earlene and I have got Kristoff and the Heroes searching for Elsa and James. The only thing we found out is that somehow they got James and Elsa vanished without a trace."

"What can I do to help?" Andrew asked.

"Do you have _any_ idea how to do all this?" Anna asked gesturing to the huge mess of papers around her. "Because I'm struggling here. I have _no idea_ how James and Elsa do this."

"It can't be that difficult, can it?" Andrew said, pulling up a seat and removing the stacks of paper on it before sitting down to get to work.

"Alright, I'll see what I can get done with the search." Earlene said before exiting the study.

The princess and Andrew sat down to get to work, slowly working through the huge amount of papers. Surprisingly, and worryingly, Anna didn't once ask for a break. She didn't even stop for a moment to absentmindedly play around with her powers. Andrew had thought she was in a bad state when he first saw her, but he was getting more and more worried about her.

Andrew put down the paper he was working on. "Anna, what's the matter?"

"What's the matter? What's the matter?!" Anna asked, getting more and more flustered. "Half, _half_ of my family just disappeared! And it's been a week and none of us even have a _clue_ what happened to them!"

Anna took a minute to calm herself down with some slow, deep breaths. Eventually, her anger faded away, leaving only depression and misery. She put her face into her hands and leaned against the desk. She took another minute, taking more ragged breaths this time. And finally, she took her face out of her hands and faced Andrew, putting on a brave, determined face.

"I'm sorry, Andrew." She said, her voice level again. "This is just, just very stressful for me."

"Don't worry," Andrew comforted. "We're going to find them."

Just then, the door to the study swung open, revealing Earlene and two other Heroes. All three bowed for Anna, even though Anna didn't care about formalities and Earlene was close enough to the royal family that she wasn't expected to bow to any of them much like Kai and Gerda. Earlene was the one to speak, "Princess Anna, I think you may be interested in this."

The princess stood up immediately. "You found them?"

"Well no. But I think we found a clue." Earlene said, gesturing behind her at the door.

Anna dropped all her queenly work and practically ran out of the door followed quickly by everyone else. After racing through the castle, Anna and the group stopped momentarily at the castle gates. The princess and temporary queen turned to her Heroes. "Alright Earlene, where's the clue?"

Just then a third hero appeared through the castle gates riding a horse with four more in tow. With an anxious look, Anna quickly mounted one of the horses as well as Earlene, Andrew, and the two other heroes. Without saying a word, Earlene led the group on a path through Arendelle towards the city limits.

On their way, Andrew was able to see the true effect of the disappearance of James and Elsa on the city and the kingdom. The entire city was in morning. All the citizens were either black, or dark and muted colors, and walked around with lowered eyes. While the shops around the town were open, their blinds were drawn and the excitement of the shopkeepers was absent. Even the skies were overcast, the occasional few drops of rain adding to the depression of the land.

After their brief path through the town, the group finally made it to the outer-gate of the city. Earlene slowed her horse to a stop and dismounted. Everyone else followed suit. Anna walked up to Earlene, still very anxious. "Where is it?"

"At your feet." Earlene said, pointing towards the ground.

Andrew hadn't even noticed. However, true to her word at Earlene's feet were deep grooves in the dirt. The grooves could only have been made by a carriage leaving the city. And guessing from how deep the grooves were, it must have been a very heavy carriage.

"I hate to be the bearer of bad news," Andrew said. "But grooves don't really tell us anything."

"On the contrary, Andrew," Earlene said. "I asked around the town, no one had seen any carriage entering or leaving the city for the last two weeks. Plus, the carriage was obviously heavy. Around the proper weight of a heavily reinforced metal carriage. And carrying either James or Elsa away would require such a carriage."

"You think these tracks could lead us to one of them?" Anna asked, desperate for any hint at finding her family.

"From what Andrew told me, I believe we can follow these tracks straight to James." Earlene explained. "And with his help, we can find Elsa in no time."

Anna looked somewhat conflicted, she probably wanted to find her sister at the same time. But she appeared to steel herself and once again put on a brave, confident mask. "Alright. Andrew, Earlene, I want you two to take a group of men and follow these tracks. Find my brother, and bring him back."

Andrew and Earlene nodded in agreement before the group remounted their horses and went back to the castle. Within a few hours, Andrew and Earlene were suited up with weapons, armor, and supplies, followed by a group of ten heroes and ten of Arendelle's guards. And before long the new group was trotting down a forested path following the deep grooves in the ground. All of them hoping that at the end of the trail, they would find James.

* * *

 **And they're off! Now we have people making moves and acting, finally some dynamics. Let's see where they'll take us. As always, please review, follow, and favorite.**

 **RWTalent**


	15. Chapter 14

**Guys, I am so sorry it's taken me so long to get another chapter up. School has started to give a crap ton of work, plus applying to college is enormously stressful. But I got this out. Once we make it to/through January it will get a LOT better. I'm still going to update though.**

 **So with Assassin's Creed Syndicate out, I'm getting a bit creative. I'm thinking of putting out another story, Frozen/Assassins Creed crossover story. It'll be James and Elsa again, just asking your opinion.**

 **Please review, follow and favorite!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **James:**

I hate being unconscious. But I hate being knocked out even more. And that's exactly what happened to me. After Elsa disappeared right in front of me, I was too distracted in the magic. A foreign magic had definitely taken her, but at the same time it felt familiar. Disturbingly familiar. That, coupled with the fact that the woman I loved had just been forcibly taken from me, distracted me enough not to see what was coming. It's kind of embarrassing, but I got swarmed and one of those people got some sort of needle coated in a knock out poison.

I came to consciousness on a cold iron floor surrounded by four short iron walls and a low hanging iron ceiling. A small square opening in one of the walls was barred with iron and let in a minimal amount of light. Judging from how the floor below me bumped and rocked, I could tell that I was moving, probably in a carriage.

I sat up, grabbed the bars on the window and took a look outside. I could see a horse trotting alongside the carriage, the horse's rider's legs, and trees passing by. Out of nowhere a club swung down and crashed with my fingers. A voice came down from the horse, "Oh no you don't! You're not escaping this time."

"Escape? What are you talking about?" I asked, rubbing my hurt fingers angrily.

"Don't play dumb. Did you really think just changing your hair color would be enough to hide you from us?" The voice responded.

"My god, I have _no idea_ what you're talking about! You've got the wrong guy!" I growled angrily.

"Impossible. The poison we use is tailored to only react to a prisoners blood."

"Well then something went wrong, you've got the wrong guy!" I shouted.

"Well do you have any brothers?" The man asked, obviously just trying to amuse me.

"No."

"Is your father dead and your last name Alexander?"

"Yes."

"Well that perfectly matches the profile of one Damien Alexander. One Damien that is a prisoner."

"What? Who is Damien?" I asked, genuinely confused.

"Ugh, enough. Just shut him up!" A voice coming from the front of the cart said.

The man riding the horse leaned to the opposite side probably pulling something out of his saddle bags. Then he leaned back over, towards the cart , and tossed a finger sized glass tube into the cart. The tube broke instantly and a sickly green smoke poured out of it.

I tried to hold my breath for as long as I could. But eventually, albeit longer than normal human could possibly do, I had to take a breath. With the first full lung full of the smoke, I started feeling drowsy. I fought it as hard as I could, but I just couldn't win, and I succumbed to the poison.

When I woke up again I was in a small jail cell. A terrifying feeling of sick familiarity snuck up on me. The last time I woke up in a jail cell, both of my legs were broken and I was beaten within an inch of my life. So understandably I was up and fully conscious instantly.

The walls were made of dark and damp cobblestone with moss growing on them. A large metal door was the only exit of the cell and had a small square cut in it through which I assumed food was passed. I noticed that my elegant clothes I had on during the dance had been replaced with rough-spun wool ones, and my shoes were irritatingly absent. In one corner laid a pile of hay which I assumed would be my bed.

I walked over to the door and looked through the hole, what little light there was only served to show that the cell was in an equally dark and wet hallway. I stepped back and raised an arm towards the door, determined to get out of the cell. I focused my will and magic on my hand, which made it glow a vibrant blue. Then I let the magic fly out of my hand in a powerful stream that smashed against the door. When the blue light faded, I could see that the door still stood blocking my path.

I frowned at that. The door should have been simultaneously blasted out of its frame and melted into unusable scrap metal. I gave the door a little push, seeing if it was dislodged but stuck in the frame. It didn't budge.

I gave it another push, stronger than the last, and again it didn't budge. I pushed it again and again, each time harder than the last, and it never moved an inch. Finally I just pulled an arm back, fist shining with an angry blue light, and simply punched the door. A flash of light exploded from where my fist collided with the cold metal.

A miniature explosion from the punch pushed me across the cell and to the floor. The door was unscratched. I growled in frustration at the door. I needed to get out of this cell and find Elsa. If I could get back to the castle courtyard I could probably find a way to track the magic that had transported her away.

 _So the door won't open_ , I thought to myself angrily. _So I'll just go through the wall_.

I turned my frustration towards the stretch of wall next to the stubborn door. I raised both arms and dunked my mind in the swelling pool of anger that was growing in my head and stomach. The anger surged through me and through my arms, solidifying into an intense darker blue ark of magic that smashed angrily into the stones.

Instead of a single brute force push against the wall, I kept up the force and the heat, trying to work my way through the wall. I kept up the flow of magic for a couple of minutes before slowly letting off gradually. When I finally shut the magic off, the wall still stood without a single burn or singe mark on it.

I slumped against a wall and slowly slid to the floor. Neither the doors nor the walls would give to my magic. I was stuck. I thought and though about a way out. Tunneling and blasting wouldn't work, there was no key hole on my side of the door so even if I find any tools I couldn't pick the lock. No one had come running from the sound of the explosions so I assumed no one was going to be susceptible to a mental attack.

After another few minutes I found out a farfetched, yet still possible, option. I stood up and moved over to my "bed". I gathered up a bunch of hay and moved to the center of the cell. I started spreading pieces of hay into a circle, making sure each piece touched the end of the next. Then I sat down and focused my magic, and started a ritual to try to contact other Primordials.


	16. Chapter 15

***Crazy/insane laughter* I did it! I got this stupid chapter done! No Internal Assessment, no test, no exam, no stupid oral or ridiculous papers could stop me! Ah, this feels nice, you know?**

 **So, what's up you guys? Long time, no see. Have you seen Star Wars VII? How've you been. Sorry for taking so long, but IB has been kicking my butt as per usual. However, I gave my word, I _will_ get this story done. **

**Although, what really got me to speed up writing were reviews (courtesy of CrystalHeart). Like I said, reviews really get me moving.**

 **So please, for mine and your sake, review, follow and favorite.**

 **(Once more, "I got it done!" + *Maniacal laughter*)**

 **Enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Elsa:**

After waking up in a strange land, trekking an unknown amount of miles, fighting a bunch of winged creatures, and finding out that I have a _husband_ , it's understandable that once Damien showed me to my room I immediately collapsed face first on the bed. Thankfully, he didn't stay and sleep with me, for whatever reason I couldn't remember anything about him or us and the thought of sleeping with any one didn't feel right with me.

When I woke up, the first rays of the morning where shining through the blinds covering my window. I stretched and slowly made my way out of the room, walking barefoot on cold wooden floors undisturbed. I wandered around the castle, completely lost, and didn't find another living soul for at least two hours.

 _Where_ is _everybody?_ I thought irritated, feeling my empty stomach growling.

I finally opened a door into a large stone courtyard open to the sky. Dead or dying plants were shriveled up in what would have been a small hedge maze pattern. Damien stood in the center, a large messenger eagle perched on his shoulder, looking over what appeared to be a letter.

I walked up to him, "So, is there a reason there's no one in the castle?"

"Uh, yes. You see, after the creatures started attacking I told them to flee the city and the castle. To protect them."

"So why are you still here?"

"Someone has to watch the castle. Plus, this is where the messenger eagles can find me. I've been searching for information on where the creatures are coming from."

"Anything interesting?" I tried to keep my voice disinterested, as if the creatures that attacked me didn't scare me half to death.

"Hm. Well, the news I have is troubling to say in the least. I have a few subjects placed in other kingdoms, trying to find out whatever they can in whatever way they way they can. And as it turns out, there's other people like us, in Arendelle; A Princess Anna Bjorgman and King James Alexander. It seems like they've found a way to summon the creatures and send them after us. I'd be willing to bet that they're the ones who kidnapped you and took your memories."

Something about Arendelle struck a chord deep inside of me. A memory flashed before my eyes. An old man with a beard, a gold crown, and a gold trimmed robe shouting angrily in what appeared to be a dining hall. A very tall blonde man, battered and bruised, rose off the floor with dark blue and angry bolts of magic flying around him. Armed men in green uniforms rushed the blonde man, and he sprung into action. Magic flew left and right, shortly followed by the men in had hit. And people collapsed not dead but bruised and moaning in pain.

I stumbled back. I had no idea where that had come from, but it was frightening. Who were those people? Was that old man King James? Or was that terrifying blonde King James? Damien crooked an eyebrow at her questioningly. "What was that?"

I quickly described the vision I had to a grim Damien. He nodded solemnly. "Yes, that sounds like King James."

"Why does he look like you?" I asked.

"Because he's my brother. My twin brother to be precise."

"Your _twin_?"

"Yes. You see, when our mother gave birth to us she apparently wasn't fully cognoscente. Maybe the nurses or doctor gave her something. The point is, once that happened she wasn't aware of nearly anything. Our father snuck in, and somehow snatched him away. That's how he ended up in Arendelle while I ended up here. I only just managed to track him down, and as it turns out he's stolen the throne of Arendelle. And now, he's sending these creatures after us. He's making a power grab for our kingdom."

"So what are we going to do about it?"

"The way I see it, there's only one thing we can do. We're not going to get anything done from here. So I've put together a little plan to liberate Arendelle from James." Damien said. "Follow me."

Damien led me through the castle, taking twists and turns that didn't seem familiar. Eventually we ended up in an underground room with no windows, torches that sprung to life as we entered the room, and a large table in the center with a map of Arendelle laid on top. For some weird reason, the room felt more familiar than the rest of the castle.

"Now, I know this may seem a little extreme but I can't think of a better plan," Damien explained. "All I've been able to figure out is that James relies more on his powers and the fear it inspires than a strong military. So, it wouldn't be unthinkable to send in troops. The only problem is James himself and the people in Arendelle. They'll either get in the way of the fighting or be used against us."

I thought for a moment about solutions. There had to be a way to keep the civilians in their houses and safe. I looked down at my hands and an idea took shape. "What if I used my power? I could freeze the roads and waterways, snow them in."

"That...that could work." Damien said. "Do you think you're strong enough to pull that off?"

I looked at my hands. If it meant being able to take down an evil king, I would just have to be powerful enough. I nodded.

"Excellent." Damien said. "But knowing James, he'll protect Arendelle with everything he's got."

"So what are we-" I started to say, but stopped suddenly as I felt another, much more powerful, vision force its way to the front of my mind. "Aw, man." I managed to say before I sunk into the vision's images.

A huge army was marching on a relatively small city surrounded by a fjord. A large fleet was inbound from the sea. Standing on a street, facing the oncoming army, was the white haired man, whom I assumed was James, wearing armor and a cape, surrounded by villagers and make-shift explosives and traps. Everybody had a grim and determined expression on their faces, and weapons in their hands.

The images shifted to the fjord nearby, with a large frozen section. Battles raged across every ship in sight as the sky above lit up with black and blue energy, which shook the ships and the ice beneath them.

The images faded and I came back to reality. I was lying on my back on the floor as Damien stood above me.

"Are you hurt?" He asked.

"No. Just seriously annoyed." I answered, picking myself up off the floor. "What is _happening_?"

"I don't know." Damien said. "But it seems like these vision are already becoming more powerful. The faster we take Arendelle and dethrone James the better." He considered something for a moment. "Come here, I'm going to try something."

I cautiously walked over to him. _Why am I feeling so nervous around him?_ I thought as I did. _I_ married _him._ He held his hands to either side of my head.

"I'm going to try to block the visions." He said. And I felt energy flow around his hands and around my head. For some reason, instead of feeling clean and crisp, like my magic did, it felt oily and thick. But I paid that no mind.

In a few moments, Damien lowered his hands. "There. That ought to do it."

It wasn't too noticeable, but there was definitely a small pressure in the back of my head. I smiled regardless, anything to keep those visions out of my head.

"So if you sent away everybody in town, how are we supposed to fight?" I asked.

"Ah, that's easy enough." Damien smiled. "Once I free the citizens of James' control, they will rush to fight with us."

"And when are we heading out?"

"Well, I've got nothing better to do." Damien said. "And there's no one around for miles, I was thinking now."

"Now? But we need to get supplies, and find some way to get to Arendelle."

"No problem. I had everything prepared in advance." Damien said. He turned towards the door and started walking out. "Come on, we leave immediately."

I stared after him for a moment. Besides being decently attractive, I couldn't figure out any particular reason I would choose to marry him. I felt like he was hiding something from me, and he was hiding his personality from me. But he saved me from those creatures, if he had any ill intent, he could have just left me to die. Plus, he had been so cordial, if not particularly nice, to me. Regardless, I chose to marry him once, so there should be no reason not to trust him. I followed him out.

Damien led me to a small dock on a river that ran west, apparently towards an ocean. Sitting anchored at the dock, a medium-sized two-mast ship floated soundly in the water. Besides the fact that the ship was armed with at least six cannons, the ship was really unremarkable.

"I've stocked the ship with enough food to last us to Arendelle and back." Damien gestured at a gang-plank up to the ship. "After you."

Within a few hours, Damien and I had set sail for Arendelle. They initially had quite a bit of trouble, Damien having trouble trying to figure out how to get a ship ready. And even if I knew, I wouldn't have remembered how to.

Regardless, we were sailing through the desolate lands of the Southern Isles, towards the ocean that I couldn't remember, and eventually to Arendelle and its evil king.

Sooner than I expected, the sun fell beneath the horizon and the stars woke up. Damien waved his hand and a red light glowed around the ship's wheel. He walked up to where I was standing, leaning on the rail of the ship.

"So, it's getting pretty late." Damien said. "We should probably go to bed."

The bottom of my stomach dropped out, and I didn't know why. _He's my husband, that isn't weird_. I tried to tell myself. But I couldn't bring myself to accept the thought of sleeping with Damien.

I smiled appologetically. "Sorry, I'm not very tired. I'll join you when I'm ready."

Damien frowned for a second, probably thinking, but responded none the less. "Whatever you want. We have a long trip ahead of us."

And with that, Damien went below deck, presumably to what was supposed to be _our_ bedroom. I stayed where I was, and I had no intention of joining him. I felt a little guilty, but more relieved than anything.

I stayed at the rail watching the stars in the sky and their reflections on the water. Eventually, my eyelids got heavy as I got tired. I sat down with the rail against my back and fell asleep with the rocking of the ship.

* * *

 **So I realized, and CrystalHeart pointed out, it's a bit weird that Damien is doubling as Elsa's husband. Just know that _that_ is not going to happen, even if Elsa doesn't know it she's still faithful to James. Anyways, I hope you guys are having an excellent time as winter break starts. **

**Please, leave a review, follow, favorite. (And leave a review, did I mention that?)**

 **RWTalent**


	17. Chapter 16

**Happy New Years everybody! So I've got good news and bad news. Good news; I'm going to go ahead and post that new story I talked about a few chapters ago, the Assassins' Creed + Frozen Crossover, so yay! Bad news; school is starting again on the fifth, and I don't really know how busy I'll be, so cross your fingers.**

 **Regardless, I'll try my best to keep updating. So please, follow, favorite, and leave a review.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **James:**

The sound of footsteps down the stone hallway woke me up. Compared to only the rhythmic drips of water to break the silence, the footsteps practically screamed at me. I picked myself up off the floor and got into a ready position.

The footsteps stopped outside of my door and I heard the sound of a key being slid in the door to unlock it. The door swung open, and I lunged towards the man who entered. A wall of force stopped me and my outreached hand a single inch from the man's face, then threw me across the cell.

My back smashed into the rear wall of the cell and slid down to the floor. The new man was very short, not just compared to me, had close-cropped reddish-brown hair, and calculating blue eyes. He, like the guards around him, wore gray pants with a grey shirt and black boots. They all had swords strapped to their belts, but the man had a more decorative one, leaning more towards a fencing foil than a sword for actual fighting. He also had a bunch of medals and ribbons on his shirt and a gold-laced cord around his waist.

"So, Damien," The man said in a strange accent that I couldn't quite place. "I heard you managed to escape. But as you can see, there's no where you can run from us. And we learn quickly, this cell has been built with enchanted stones to prevent another magic escape."

The man leaned in very close to my face. "I just want you to know, that you will _never_ see the light of day again."

Of course, I _think_ that's what he said. As he got close to my face, the stress that had built up from the past three days in captivity suddenly surfaced at the same time. Blood roared in my ears and I wasn't really able to hear the man.

From the first day, or night I couldn't tell without the sun as a reference, I had tried to contact other Primordials. But I hadn't heard anything back from them, not a message, not even an empathetic feeling. On top of that, I hadn't had any real food besides an occasional piece of bread that was slid through the door.

But the worst thing were the dreams. Every time I went to sleep, I saw images of things that I was positive were happening elsewhere in the world. I saw Anna sitting behind a desk, tear stains on her face as she desperately tried to take on a gigantic pile of paperwork in mine and Elsa's desk. I saw Andrew and Earlene, accompanied by a group of Arendellian guards, trekking through a dark forest, beaten and tired. Their weapons were bloodied and their armor seemed ripped up, but covered with wolf pelts. And I saw Elsa being attacked by horrible flying creatures, and then being tricked and led off into a darkened castle by a man that looked almost identical to me, before my hair turned brown, that smiled a sick and twisted grin.

I simply couldn't deal with it all at the same time. So as ,whoever that man was, leaned down to talk to me, my anger exploded.

With his face so close to mine, I leaned my head back then threw it forward, smashing my forehead against the man's nose.

The man's nose broke instantly with a crunch. As he reeled back in surprise, I jumped up and spun him around, wrapping one arm around his neck as the other held one of his arms in a more painful position. I managed to do this just in time, the two guards that had followed him in had drawn their swords and were mid-lunge but pulled back to avoid hurting my hostage.

Before the guards could figure out that they had me outnumbered and literally up against a wall, I threw the man at the guard on my left, forcing them both to tumble over, while at the same time pulling out the man's sword.

The remaining guard tried to swing his sword at me again, but I parried and countered. Unfortunately for the guard, he was fighting a Primordial, and the Primordial of Heroes at that. Even having been knocked unconscious twice and kidnapped, not being fed anything but a few pieces of bread, and been cooped up in a tiny cell, he was no match for me. I quickly cut his hand, making him drop his sword, then hit the guard with the bottom of my sword-hilt in the temple. The guard crumpled.

I turned back to the two that I had knocked over, both of which were starting to stand up. I kicked the red-headed man, knocking him out. Then I turned to the guard I had thrown the red-head at. I grabbed the front of his uniform and forced him up and against a wall.

"I. Am. Not. Damien." I growled. Then, using a bit of magic, I lifted him off the floor, still against the cell wall. "Now. Where is my stuff?"

Moments later, I was running down dark stone hallways towards my stolen things. Every so often a guard would show up and try to stop me, but every time I left them disarmed and either unconscious or injured.

I eventually ended up in front of a large steel door. Pushing the door open revealed a huge room filled with piles of clothes, weapons, and tons of other stuff people would carry around with them. I dropped the sword I had stolen and started searching the piles for my sword and the clothes I had been wearing.

I was still looking through the pile of weapons when a stream of guards came pouring in through the door I stupidly left open. Grabbing the closest thing I could get, a red and white Greek circular shield with a star in the center, and I threw it at the first guard. The shield bounced off the guard, sending him flying backwards, then bounced off a wall, then a pile of pocket watches, then another guard, and then came back to me which I caught.

I took a second to blink in surprise at the shield, then was forced to jump back into the fight as the second guard closed in. I blocked with the shield and spun it, hitting the guard in the face with a clang. Then a guard closed in from behind, I spun around and hit him in the stomach with the shield.

The fight raged on. The guards had me outnumbered and out-armed, but I outclassed all of them put together. I kept losing weapons and picking up new ones. At one point I was fighting with half of a broken spear, at another I fought with a whip that had blades made into it.

Eventually, the guards stopped charging me. They stayed ten feet away from me in a large circle, all of them too afraid to attack me. The man I had head butted in my cell came walking in, holding a bloodied rag to his nose.

"A decent try, Damien," he said, stopping at the edge of the circle. "But you're surrounded, and we've locked the building down."

"How many times do I have to tell you people?" I demanded. "My name is James Alexander, I'm the prince of Primordials and the Primordial of Heroes. And I _am_ going to get out of here and find my wife, and _you_ off all people are not going to stop me."

The man's pupils dilated, and the blood drained out of his face. One of the guards got overzealous and charged at me. I blocked his sword with the staff I had picked up, but in the process it broke in half. The man looked surprised at first, then smiled stupidly, right up until I punched him in the nose.

Taking the small break in fighting that afforded me, I reached out with my right hand and used a bit of magic to call my sword. A large pile of weapons rumbled for a moment then my blue sword flew out and into my hand. I caught it a let a little magic flow through it, causing the blade to glow blue.

"Stop!" The man shouted. All the guards lowered their weapons and looked at the man with confusion. The man turned to the guard on his left. "You said you picked him up in Arendelle?"

"Y-yes." The guard stammered. "At a fancy party at the castle."

"And have you never heard of King James?!" The man shouted. " _The_ King James who fought the literal embodiment of darkness, who married the Snow Queen!"

The man turned back to me with an apologetic look. "I am _so_ sorry for my men's _ineptitude_ , your highness."

I lowered my sword, letting the blue glow die down. " _Now_ you recognize me?"

"Well, having dealt with your brother for so long, we've come to expect tricks and deceit. So we just assumed that if the sleep poison worked, then you must have been him."

"Brother?" I asked. "What do you mean, _brother_? I don't have any siblings."

The man looked pitiful. "Oh, your majesty, you don't know? Haven't you found out what happened to your father?"

* * *

 **Alright, hope you enjoyed the chapter, a little more action than usual. If you like it, tell me so. And if you have a suggestion, tell it to me, I listen to them. Please follow, favorite, and leave a review or PM me. And look for my cross-over story "Frozen Assassin".**

 **RWTalent**


	18. Chapter 17

**I have a late Christmas present for you all, another chapter! And I have another pre-written for next-week. Hopefully I'll be able to update more than I have been, but once we make it past April/May I'll be able to update like crazy. Just please have patience. Regardless, here is the next chapter for you all.**

 **Please follow, favorite and leave a review. A special thanks for all of those who have.**

 **Enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Andrew:**

After trekking over mountains and through wolf-infested forests, Andrew was exhausted and hurting all over. Him and the rest of the group had to leave their horses behind in the mountains, so they had to walk however far was left. His feet hurt from walking so long, the bottom of his boots had worn so thin he could practically feel the small rocks under his feet, and scrapes on his leg and arms from an encounter with a wolf pack still stung.

He and Earlene were camping out in a relatively clear section of the forest they were hiking through. They had a fire crackling between them as they sat on a pair of fallen tree logs. As usual, the guards and the heroes that accompanied them were lagging far behind, so the two senior heroes sat alone for the moment.

"Ugh, I feel like we've spent more time sitting around waiting for the others than actually tracking James down." Earlene complained.

"You've got to give them a break, they've never had to do anything like this." Andrew said. "Any idea how much farther we have to go?"

"The cart tracks look fresh and deep. I'd say they've been made recently. We're close. Very close." Earlene said, inspecting the cart tracks that they'd been following for what seemed like forever.

A moment of silence before Andrew spoke up again. "How do you think Anna is handling everything down in Arendelle?"

"She's the princess. I have faith she'll be able to hold the country together." Earlene said, but Andrew didn't believe it.

"C'mon, tell me what you really think." Andrew called her out.

Earlene sighed, knowing she wasn't going to be able to get out of telling her partner. "I think I should have stayed to help Anna. She's got a great heart, but not the right mindset to handle all that work."

Andrew took a moment to think of a response but was cut off as the guards and the heroes stumbled into the clearing out of breath and exhausted. Earlene and Andrew laughed at how tired they looked, relative to the guards and heroes; Andrew and Earlene were energetic.

"About time you showed up," Earlene mocked. "We were just getting tired of sitting."

"So...I say...we set up camp-," one of the heroes started to say when Earlene heard an alarm bell ringing in the distance.

Earlene held her hand up, signaling for silence, twisting her head around to find which direction the sound was coming from. She suddenly stood up and started off in the direction of the noise. Andrew quickly followed after her. The guards and the heroes grumbled angrily and continued to follow slowly after the senior heroes.

Andrew ran through the forest, keeping a few feet behind Earlene and she followed her ear. Rain started to fall around them and lightning flashed in the sky above them. Eventually, they broke through the tree line, revealing a huge brick building.

It was shaped like a very large box with very few windows. A storm raged above it, covering everything around them in vast amounts of water. Around the building was a large brick wall with wrought iron spike protruding from the top. In front of the group, there was a large wooden door with iron bands to reinforce it, guarded by two men in full armor and armed with swords. The two men spotted the Arendellian party immediately, they drew their weapons and charged.

Andrew and the group wasted no time, all drawing their weapons and charging the men as well. The two guards didn't last long, one swipe from Andrew's swords disarmed one man, who was soon knocked out with a hit to the head from a hero's sword pommel. The other man's legs got swept from beneath him by Earlene's staff, then got crushed as two heroes jumped on top of him.

"Get those doors down!" Earlene shouted to the guards, who had brought heavy axes with them.

Andrew noticed men appearing at the top of the building with crossbows. "Heroes, up top. Keep those arrows off of us!"

Five heroes raised their hands and formed a protective bubble around the whole group with their magic, which shimmered and glowed in a variety of different colors. The guards started hacking the door to pieces. The remaining five heroes either pulled ranged weapons from their backs or started firing bolts of magic at the archers above.

The guards made decent progress, but more and more archers started appearing at the top of the building, firing down at the group. Once the guards had made a significant dent in the door, Earlene grabbed one of the guards on the shoulder. "Guards, step back. Andrew, we're running out of time, we blow through the door."

Andrew nodded as the guards moved behind Andrew and Earlene. Andrew raised one of his swords towards the sky, focusing his energy and tapping into the energy of the storm above him. Earlene centered herself and dropped her weight, taking a deep breath and gathering energy of her own.

Andrew raised his other sword to point at the door. Lightning flashed down into Andrew's upraised sword, protected by his magic the lightning raced through Andrew's body and down his other sword and cracked into the door. At the same time, Earlene threw her free hand forward, followed by a huge rush of concentrated air as well as a large piece of stone being pushed up into the point Andrew's lightning crashed into the door.

The combination of lightning, concentrated air, and stone smashing into the door blew a large hole through the thick wood. Unfortunately, the lightning went through the group's shield, shattering it instantly. Earlene shouted, "Run! Get into the building!"

The group sprinted towards a set of doors leading into the building, dodging a hail of arrows. Andrew barely had enough time to take account of his surroundings as he ran. The distance from the wall to the building was all stone, no grass or plants. And no decorations, no fountain, no decorative stonework. Just flat, smooth stone the entire way around the building.

The group burst through the doors into a reception area of some sort. A large desk with bars protecting whoever sat behind it. And a large iron door to one side leading deeper into the building. The guards slammed the doors shut behind them, and leaned their shoulders into the doors to brace it.

"C'mon. Now time to lose," Earlene said, starting to move towards the iron door.

Andrew leaned against the desk with the bars, trying to catch his breath. He was best at sword play and armed combat, not too powerful with magic like Earlene was, and nowhere near as powerful as either James or Elsa. Harnessing the lightning was the only way he could have had enough energy to blast straight through the door, but in doing so he spent a lot of energy making sure he wasn't fried in the process. Even so, his skin still let off steam and he could smell the faintest hints of smoke and electricity. "Can't, we just, take, a second?"

Earlene looked at him, and her eyes widened. She rushed over and put her arms under his to support him. She started channeling energy into him, restoring his energy supply. She glared at the heroes. "Get that door open, now!"

Loud thuds started sounding from the doors to the outside and the guards had to push with all their strength to keep them closed. All ten heroes rushed over to the iron door and starting focusing small flames, trying to melt the lock and mechanism of the door open.

Earlene helped Andrew sit down and lean against the desk and kneeled next to him, concern in her eyes. "Andrew, what happened? Are you okay?"

"Just, tired." Andrew tried to explain. "Never, had, much energy."

Earlene looked over to the iron door, "How long until that door's open?"

"Couple of seconds!" A hero called back.

The doors to the outside burst open, knocking the guards back, thankfully the door was too small to let them all in at the same time, so for a second they got stuck as they all tried to rush in. Earlene snatched up one of Andrew's swords in her left hand and picked up her staff in her right and turned back to the armed men who were trying to swarm in.

She pointed the tip of her staff towards the open door, seemingly all the air in the room rushed forward, being sucked from every place it could be, extinguishing the heroes' flames. The air actually picked up a couple of men and threw them back, and knocked the rest of them away from the door.

Earlene stalked forward, Andrew could feel the energy flow from the earth beneath her feet and in the air flow through her. Andrew's blade glowed an angry, hot orange, the rain dropping on the blade sizzled and steamed. The men close the her on the ground started to crawl backwards away from her. The ones further back got to their feet and charged towards her.

That was a mistake. Earlene became a whirlwind of burning iron and painfully sturdy wood. The armed men fell unconscious or wounded around her in droves. Andrew's eyebrows climbed high and his breath hitched as he witnessed his friend and partner fight with a fury like he had never seen before.

Iron popped somewhere to his left, but Andrew was too distracted watching Earlene singlehandedly fight off swarms of men.

One of the heroes said uncertainly, "Uh, Andrew...?"

A shadow fell over Andrew, and he finally looked to his left. And if it was possible, his eyebrows climbed even higher. Standing above him, was James Alexander himself. He was wearing the same fancy robes he had been when he was taken during the dance, albeit not fully buttoned up. And he was definitely thinner and more tired-looking than Andrew remembered him. But it was definitely James standing above him.

James looked out the door at Earlene, then turned to Andrew. "Stay here, don't fight, I'll handle it."

Andrew, his jaw wide open, watched James walk to the steps of the doors and shout, "Earlene! Enough! Drop the weapons!"

Earlene whipped around in surprise at the sound of her king's voice. She hesitated a second, but lowered her weapons. The sword she had borrowed from Andrew drooped, melting from the heat Earlene had pumped through it, so she actually dropped that one. The men she had been fighting recovered but didn't jump back into the fighting, casting nervous glances at James.

"James?" Earlene asked.

James smiled at her. "Thanks for coming after me. Come inside, we'll figure this all out."

James led Earlene back inside. Earlene looked back at the melted remains of Andrew's sword, then back at Andrew, "Sorry about your sword. I'll replace it for you."

"I've never seen you fight like that." Andrew said, so many surprising things almost overwhelming him.

"Well, don't make me do it again." Earlene said sadly, looking down.

A short man with reddish brown hair and cold calculating eyes, who appeared through the iron door said in a strange accent, "Will you people stop damaging my prison and harming my guards?! Honestly, just get in here and let me try to explain what is going on!"

* * *

 **So, not a lot of plot happened in this one, but the next is almost all plot so I thought I'd give you some more action to even it all out. If you'd like another story of mine, I'm writing another one, "Frozen Assassin". It's a crossover between Frozen and Assassin's Creed. It's still got James and Elsa, but he's an Assassin instead of a Primordial. Check it out, it's pretty good if I do say so myself.**

 **If you enjoyed this chapter, or enjoy the story so far, please follow, favorite, and drop a review for me.**

 **See you next time.**

 **RWTalent**


	19. Chapter 18

**Greetings, all once again. Another chapter for your reading pleasure. Just to let you know, February might get a little hectic, so be warned. But in April and May, I'll have a ton of free time to write. Not much to say today from my end. So please, follow, favorite, and leave a review.**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **James:**

Andrew, Earlene, the strange man who's nose I broke, and I gathered together in the man's office. The room was much more orderly than mine back in Arendelle. Around the room were bookshelves with books that were neat, and ordered in alphabetical order. There were no papers stacked on the desk or on the two chairs sitting in front of the desk.

The man sat down behind his desk, still holding up a bloodied rag to his nose. The majority of the guards and the heroes stayed outside. Andrew collapsed into one of the chairs in front of the desk, still magically exhausted. Earlene decided to stand away from the rest of the group, in a corner by herself. I finished putting on a sword belt, sheathing my blue sword, and sat down in the remaining chair in front of the man's desk.

"Alright, now that all the fighting has stopped, I think it's time for answers." I said, wanting to get home as soon as possible.

The man pulled away the rag, feeling his nose gingerly. He grunted in pain. "Well, _I_ think you should fix my nose before I do anything."

I scowled but stood up and leaned over the desk. I grabbed his nose, letting some magic through my hand, and forced it back into place with a _snap_. The man doubled over, gasping in pain as his nose was reset magically, if a little gracelessly.

"Now," I said as I took my seat again. "Please tell us what's going on."

The man glared at me, but spoke none the less. "To begin, I should probably tell me what this place is. We call this place The Asylum, and as far as we can tell this place has been around for centuries. My name is Trollope Harding, and I'm the warden of The Asylum."

"Wait, how can you be a warden if this is an Asylum?" Andrew questioned.

"Well, that's what makes this place different from the rest." Trollope explained. "We're both a mental asylum and a prison. We hold some of the most dangerous people in the world here, the power-hungry, and the criminally insane."

"And you think my brother, who I doubt actually _exists_ , is being held here?" I asked.

"Well, we _thought_ he was. He escaped a while ago, and we've been looking for him. We thought _you_ were him, until I figured it all out. You see we use a gaseous poison to knock out particularly dangerous prisoners, but it works with a small enchantment that makes it only work on people who have the same blood as the prisoner we use it on." He explained. "And so, since it worked on you, we just assumed..."

I leaned back in my chair, thinking through the new information."So what you're saying is..."

"That your brother, Damien, was a prisoner here before he escaped." Trollope finished for me.

A moment of silence passed over the group. Andrew spoke up for me, a little shocked by the news, "Why was Damien in here?"

"He was in here for ten years," Trollope started. He stood up and took a book from his bookshelf. He placed it on his desk and flipped through it. "Ah, here we are. He was put here for...six counts of manslaughter, and patricide."

Trollope turned the book around and showed me the contents. There was a very good sketch of Damien above a long list of his crimes. He looked exactly like me, at least before my fight with Lognath. He had blonde hair and green eyes, just like I did. But he looked angrier than I typically do, and much grimmer.

"No, no that makes no sense." I said. "I know my mom, and she would know if she had any other kids. I'm the only one she knows."

"Ah, well, she wouldn't know." The man said. "After taking him in, we got a chance to hear his part of the story. It pains me to tell you this but, your father was a drunk vagrant, angry at the world and believed everything and everyone was out to get him.

"From what we learned, he pretended to leave your mother once he found out she was pregnant, but followed her from a distance. When she gave birth, she passed out and your father took advantage of that. With your mother unable to protest, your father stole her baby away. But, unbeknownst to him, and to you and your mother, she had twins. She had _you_.

"So, not knowing that one of her twin children had been stolen, your father was able to raise your brother by himself. He taught him to hate the world, to be jealous of people who had anything that he didn't. Your father wanted to turn him into a weapon, a tool to use against whatever poor sap had gotten on his bad side.

"It backfired. Damien killed your father. Then he went on a criminal rampage, taking and doing whatever he wanted. Eventually we got wind of what he had done and captured him. We didn't think anything about him, we hold lots of dangerous people here, but something changed. Before he escaped, we found odd circles and symbols drawn in his cell, we found out too late he was gathering lots of magic power. He used it to simply bust out of here."

"He blasted through the walls?" I asked. "I thought they were enchanted."

"We have cells for people with and without magic, but we didn't know he had magic, so he wasn't in an enchanted cell."

"So what you're saying is that there's a dangerous, magical criminal running around somewhere the world, and he's related to James?" Earlene spoke up.

"Yes. But we'll be sending out more search parties since you aren't Damien." Trollope said.

"Does he know about me?" I asked.

A pause before the warden answered, his head cast downwards. "We believe so, we give the prisoners either popular news or news from their hometown. And your besting of the Emperor, Lognath, the reveal of a Primordial, and your marriage coronation were all _very_ popular news."

I could feel the blood run out of my face. I knew logically I was wrong, and that no one would agree with what I was thinking, but I couldn't help myself. I somehow made the connection between Damien's escape with my escapades in Arendelle. I saw that I had caused all this, the violence, the panic. The candles spaced around the room, throwing light on all of us, started to flicker as my magic reacted to the guilt crushing down on me.

Then dread made the bottom of my stomach drop as I remembered a certain part of my dream. I turned to Andrew, grabbing him by the shoulder. "Andrew, where's Elsa?"

Andrew looked shocked for a second he glanced towards Earlene. "W-what?"

"Andrew." I said, my voice dropping as I got more and more panicked. "Where. Is. Elsa?"

"We...we don't know." Andrew answered, then realization dawned in his eyes.

"Back to Arendelle." I said. "We have to get back!"

Earlene helped Andrew up and hurried them out of the room. I looked over at Trollope, who just looked sad. He said, "I'm sorry. This is the sort of thing we try to stop."

"It's not your fault." I said, turning towards the door. "It's mine."

* * *

 **Have you guys checked out Frozen Assassin? It's my other story, crossover between Assassin's Creed and Frozen. So far, I think it's really good. And apparently a bunch of others do as well. Check it out, maybe? Anyways, please follow, favorite, and leave a review. It helps me to write faster.**

 **RWTalent**


	20. Chapter 19

**Well, I just took my IB English Oral Commentary and was told that I did amazing, and also turned in my ToK (Theory of Knowledge) Essay. Long story short; I'm pretty happy today.**

 **So I'm putting out a little chapter for you all, setting up the battle zone so to say. Please follow, favorite, and leave a review. I'm going to go take a nap now, so enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Anna:**

Anna's world was falling apart around her. Her sister had disappeared in a flash of light. The only person who could figure out how to find her, her brother-in-law, had been attacked and stolen away. Two of her best friends, Earlene and Andrew, went out weeks ago in search of her brother-in-law and no one has heard from them sense. And on top of that, Anna was being overwhelmed with all the work of managing a kingdom.

Kristoff, bless his heart, had tried to help her with all the paperwork and meetings. The problem was that he hadn't been raised to do all that work and so he simply didn't know what needed to be done. Even Anna wasn't close to being as good as Elsa, or even James, at all this work. And the kingdom was suffering as a result.

Food wasn't getting to where it needed to be. The crime rate exploded as the guards focused on protecting the castle. Anna had cut off any communication with outside nations besides Corona, afraid that the other nations would take advantage of Anna's inexperience and manipulate her into signing a bad deal.

All that put together had upset the people. At first they had mourned the loss of both their beloved King and Queen. Then at their princess', and temporary ruler's, behest they had tried to keep hope high and go about their business as normal. But without food, without the safety they had grown used to, and without any news regarding their normal, and much more skilled, King and Queen, unrest spread like wildfire through the kingdom.

Anna sat in her sister's office, the curtains draw, and even more papers strewn everywhere than before. Her eyes stung, just on the verge of tears as she finally came to the conclusion that she wasn't going to be enough to maintain the kingdom. She wasn't as good at finding fine details and memorizing legal rules and loopholes as Elsa. And she wasn't as good at negotiating, motivating the citizens, or as wise as James. She was just Anna, the spare. She was given the most basic political training, but just enough to maintain the kingdom until she could be married off to a king or prince that knew what he was doing.

Anna was so busy beating herself up, desperately trying to find the strength to keep fighting, that she didn't notice when the door to the office opened. Kristoff cautiously stepped through the door, noticing his wife on the verge of a breakdown. He quickly walked over, trying carefully not to step on and crush any of the papers on the floor, and wrapped his wife up in his arms.

"Hey, we'll get through this." Kristoff said. "I bet Andrew and Earlene have already found James and are either on their way back already tracking down Elsa."

"Y-you think so?" Anna asked.

"Of course, James may be peace-loving and kind, but there is nothing that will stop him from going after Elsa."

Anna took a deep breath and smiled. She started to relax, telling herself in her mind that James and Elsa would be back and take charge again. She vowed she would appreciate what they do more, before she got irritated when they wouldn't be able to spend time with her because of some of this work. But now she would understand, as a matter of fact she would even help them out.

The study's door burst open, sending papers flying. Captain Franz stood in the doorway, his uniform torn in multiple places, his hair blown to one side, and his face flustered. "You're Highness, we have a problem in the main courtyard."

The three got up and jogged towards the courtyard. Kristoff grabbed his pickaxe and Franz drew his sword. They flung the castle doors open and saw just what Franz was freaking out about. A whole squad of guards stood at the bottom of the stairs up to the doors, standing shoulder to shoulder using shields to hold back a giant crowd of angry citizens.

"Franz, what's going on?" Anna asked.

"We've got a traitor." Franz said gravely.

"A traitor?" Anna repeated, surprised. "W-what do you mean?"

"There's the princess!" A voice shouted over the din of the crowd.

Anna scanned the crowd, looking for the person who had shouted. She finally found him and nearly had a heart attack. Standing above the crowd was Neil, the hero that James and Elsa had sent to the Southern Isles. But now he stood among the rolling crowd, shouting hate and further stirring the riot up.

The hero drew his sword, she could feel magic stir around him. He pointed the tip of his sword at Anna and shouted, "Get her!"

The crowd surged forward, simply forced their way forward through the line of guards, knocking them over and rolled over them. Anna threw her hands forward, sending a spout of flame at the ground before the crowd, creating a wall of flames between her and them. Kristoff, instead of fighting, just grabbed his wife and dragged her into the castle, just before the rioters leaped over the flames and continued their charge.

The two ran through the castle, not going any direction in particular, just trying to get away from the roar of the pursuing crowd. They ran past armed guards who ran towards the crowd, trying to do anything to slow down the attack.

Occasionally, a rioter would appear around a blind corner and lash out with an improvised weapon; a spear made of sharpened sticks, a large forging hammer, and like things. Either Kristoff would knock them out with the blunt parts of his pickaxe or Anna would knock them back with a small fireball.

Eventually, Kristoff and Anna burst out of a rear door of the castle, out onto a small expanse of beech leading to the fjord, where Elsa had fled from her coronation so long ago. Thinking quickly, Kristoff slammed the door shut behind them and swung his pickaxe into the door at an angle so that it went through both the door and the wooden door frame, making sure it was stuck.

Immediately, the door started rattling in its hinges, the sounds of angry people smashing against the door made Anna jump and desperately stare at the pickaxe stuck in the door.

"Kristoff, what do we do?" Anna said, cradling her swollen stomach.

"Hop on board, that's what!" A voice shouted behind them.

The two royals turned, finding a large boat sitting a few feet out from the shore. On board, a collection of James' heroes climbed around the rigging, raising sails and pulling out line. The mainmast flew a purple flag with a light blue snowflake and a dark blue sword.

The hero who was sailing the boat, a younger girl with green-colored hair pulled back in a ponytail. She, along with the rest of the heroes, wore a blue-green uniform with hoods, cloaks and a sword belt that held swords, knives, and various other weapons. "Well? What are you waiting for? Get over here!"

"Anna, let's go!" Kristoff yelled. He pushed off the door, grabbed Anna, and pulled them both into the surf.

The water was cold, almost painfully so. But the sound of wood cracking and splitting behind her inspired enough fear in Anna to make her keep sprinting through the water. Kristoff helped push Anna up onto the boat, with heroes helping her from the top, before climbing up rope ladders onto the top-deck.

"Royals secured, let's get it moving!" A hero shouted to the helm.

"Full sail, drop anything we can afford to lose!" The green-haired hero shouted. Heroes started picking up barrels and throwing them over the rails, throwing suitcases and luggage overboard as well.

The sailed unfurled, whipping and snapping in a furious magical wind a group of five heroes whipped up. The boat lurched forward, not gliding through the water as usual, but pushing through, trying to go as fast as it could.

Looking behind, Anna saw the door she and Kristoff had escaped from burst violently open. Angry people with weapons and torches spilled through, shouting impotently from the shore as Anna, Kristoff, and their rescuing heroes sailed off.

Anna sat down and leaned her back against the railing, Kristoff slid down next to her. The heroes ran the deck, non-stop, making adjustments to the rigging, making sure the sails were taut, or just finding _anything_ to do, as if stopping for a moment was unacceptable.

The green-haired girl who piloted the ship walked up to them, kneeling down in front of them. "Princess Anna, Prince Kristoff."

"I'm sorry," Anna said, exhausted from sprinting. "I don't think I know your name."

"My name doesn't matter." She said. "What does matter is who we are. We're a secret group of specially trained heroes, with the only purpose of protecting the royal family. You're brother, sister, Andrew, and Earlene set us up a while ago."

"What happened?" Kristoff asked. "That riot came out of nowhere."

"Unfortunately it didn't." The girl said. "We've been trying to keep an eye on Neil ever since he came back from the Southern Isles. But with the King and Queen missing, we've been stretched thin just making sure your orders are followed through. That riot was our fault, we should have been trying to stop Neil much earlier, he's been spreading rumors, anger, and hate all over Arendelle."

The information soaked gradually into Anna's brain, but she was too tired to process it just yet. So instead of following up on that information, she asked a different question, "Where are we going?"

"A safe house King James and Queen Elsa set up on the North Mountain, in Elsa's ice castle." The girl explained. "We're going to sail around a ways, then hike up the mountain from the east side. Hopefully we'll be able to avoid any of Neil's agents or riled up citizens that way."

Anna nodded numbly. Anna just couldn't process any of the information the girl was telling her. And she couldn't stop the salty tears that spilled down from her eyes. Before, her world was falling apart around her. Now, she felt like she had nothing anymore. She had lost half her family, and now she had run away as her home was taken by force.

Kristoff wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close, offering what little comfort he could give her. The green-haired girl nodded sadly, before standing at getting back to work.

The royals remained sitting where they had climbed aboard, trying to figure out what they were going to do. Anna felt Kristoff look up, at a dark, stormy sky. And she heard him say softly, "Please, James, Elsa. Please. Come back, we need you."


	21. Chapter 20

**Oh my lord, I am so bogged down in so much unnecessary work, and I still haven't actually accepted any college. But I was able to type this chapter up real fast. Sorry it's taken so long, I really am trying. Thanks to all those who've stuck around all this time, it means a lot. Anyway, please review, follow and favorite.**

 **RWTalent**

* * *

 **Elsa:**

Being part of a sneak attack, I didn't expect much of a hostile reception. But I expected _something_. When Damien and I docked our ship in Arendelle there wasn't even a small groups of guards waiting for us. Of course, that didn't change Damien's suspicion. He jumped the railing of the ship on to the pier with his sword drawn, a two and a half foot, curved, red steel scimitar.

I still hadn't decided exactly how I felt about Damien. He seemed nice enough, he had mostly left her alone during the trip, instead focusing on keeping up the ship's enchantments and directing them to Arendelle. He didn't even make a comment when I repeatedly found a reason to sleep anywhere other than their bedroom, although I noticed that he got progressively more grumpy because of that.

But I had a job to do, Arendelle was under the control of an evil king. I could settle my marital hesitations after the people of Arendelle were liberated. I hopped over the railing of the ship after Damien, and created a razor-sharp ice sword.

I walked carefully from the docks to the main streets of the city, while Damien walked confidently as if he wasn't even concerned about being attacked. Eventually, we both made it to the main town square, where a single man was standing perfectly still, waiting. He had a thin black mustache that matched his slicked back black hair. He had dark brown eyes sunk deep into his head, with dark circles underneath them and popped out red veins in the white part of his eyes.

"Neil!" Damien called, a wolfish smile spreading across his face. "Tell me everything's going to plan."

"Perfectly, sire." Neil said, oddly stiffly, with no emotion and no visible change on his face. "James is no longer in Arendelle. I have incited a small revolt, and we have taken the castle."

"Taken the castle?" I asked, suddenly worried. The whole reason I had agreed to attack the country was to protect its citizens, and why I agreed to freeze the country over. Revolts were dangerous, no matter how small. "Was anyone hurt?"

Neil didn't respond, he didn't even react to my question. Damien glanced towards me. "Any casualties?"

"No, Your Highness. A few injured. Nothing life-threatening." Neil reported.

"Where is the royal family?" Damien questioned.

Damien hadn't mentioned a family. "James is quickly approaching the northern border of the country. The rest of the royal family managed to escape just before we took the castle. They've managed to evade detection so far. And I've sent a team of loyal soldiers to intercept James and his small group of heroes."

"And the rest of the heroes?" Damien asked, putting an inflection on "heroes" to make it sound like an insult.

"Scattered," Neil said. "But I've sent messages to the bordering nations, telling them to look out for the fugitives."

"Excellent," Damien said, "Take us to the castle."

Much too stiffly for my liking, Neil turned on his heel and started walking down a street. Damien started after him, I hesitated, but followed after. As we walked through the streets, I noticed something strange; there was no one walking around, no one looking out of their windows, no one in sight. It felt an awful lot like the emptiness in the Southern Isles.

"Where are all the people?" I asked.

Again, Neil didn't answer, he just kept walking, leading us through the city. Damien answered my question instead, "All the people have been moved to somewhere warm, to keep them safe while you freeze the country."

That should have assured me, but I still had a small doubt about the plan. I just couldn't figure out what I was doubting. The plan was a good one. While on the ship, Damien had further explained his plan. He had gotten letters from messenger hawks reporting that a legion of troops evacuated from the Southern Isles had regrouped and were prepared to help defend Arendelle. Those troops were waiting on a dozen ships few miles off-shore.

We finally arrived at a small stone bridge spanning a fjord, across the bridge stood the castle. It was a small castle compared to the one in the Southern Isles, and not very impressive either. It had a thick wall with a dozen guard towers and a set of heavy iron and wood doors. The main castle was tall, with many towers but besides that, it had no considerable defenses or special "tyrannical king" features, such as statues or golden pillars. It seemed like a normal, small-country castle.

"We're here," Damien said with a smile. "It's almost time. Neil, assist with the arrival of the troops."

Neil bowed, then marched back towards the docks. Damien and I started across the bridge, toward the large pair of doors closing off the wall. Damien raised a hand, pointing his palm at the doors, a flash of red light and a loud boom later and the doors were reduced to a pair of smoking hinges and debris laying around the courtyard.

We walked across the courtyard to the doors closing off the castle and Damien did away with them the same way he did the castle gates.

Damien walked purposely through the newly formed hole in the door and started off down a seemingly random hallway. Instead of following him immediately, like I should have, I looked around the entryway to the castle. Paintings and colorful tapestries hung on the wall, all depicting some sort of scene of beauty or courage. Windows along the exterior wall let in natural light, warming the browns and reds of the wall's paint.

Everything felt warm, cozy, not at all like what I had pictured James' castle to be. And what was worse, it felt strangely familiar. As if I had known the castle before, but there was a slight change.

Before I could figure out why the building felt familiar, Damien called out, "Elsa, are you coming or not?"

I took one last look around me before continuing to follow Damien. We walked through the castle, all decorated similarly to the entryway, up a few flights up stairs and opened a door to the top of the center tower. It was a small wooden deck under the conic top, with a polished wooden guard rail around the edge. From the tower, I could see the whole city and a large part of the forest around the city.

"Alright, here we are," Damien said, excitement apparent in his voice. He spread his arms, "Shall we?"

I looked over the city, the Southern Isles ships had managed to unload their troops and gotten to safer waters. I sighed, despite how abandoned the city looked and knowing that freezing it over was going to help keep James at bay outside the city to protect the citizens, I still didn't feel very comfortable freezing it.

 _It's for the greater good,_ I told myself. I raised my arms over the city. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath focusing my thoughts, and building up the energy inside of me. The pressure built behind my eyes and in my chest as the magic gained more and more strength. Finally I opened my eyes, and light blue magic burst from my hands, spraying out over the city and beyond. Ice crackled and snapped, snow appeared out of nowhere and blanketed the area, snow clouds built up over the city and started swirling in the sky letting out a perpetual wave of snow.

When I closed my hands, the blue magic died away leaving Arendelle frozen to the core. The roads were not only slicked with ice, but covered with deep snow. The snow storm over the city churned, spilling limitless amounts of snow onto the city without need of my magic. And the fjord, along with the docks were frozen solid, denying any access by ship.

Damien looked out to the horizon, where a small wave of blue magic still surged over the land, spreading my magic further than I intended. He laughed, a little more harsh than I expected it to be. "It appears to be that you've frozen over the whole country this time!"

"This time?" I asked. "What do you mean?"

"Uh-" Damien said, suddenly at a loss for words. "I mean...I had run through this scenario in my head so long, and you've surpassed all of my expectations."

"Mmhmm." I looked out over the now frozen lands. "I just hope this works as you planned it to."

"Don't worry," Damien said, hands on the railing. "The snow will slow him, and we will meet him when he is weak and tired. We'll have dethroned James in no time."

The sun set behind the mountain range as I thought about when James finally arrived in Arendelle, and how Damien and I will finally free this land of its tyrant.


	22. Chapter 21

**Alright, _finally_ got this chapter up. Sorry it's taken so long, I've been losing sleep this entire year (so far) because of homework and college applications. But most of that's out of the way. The only thing really left is final exams in May, so be aware of delays around the beginning of May. For anyone who's still reading this despite how long it's taking me to update, thank you for having faith in me. I'm not going to be like a bunch of other writers (not mentioning any names) and give up on their stories. We're kind of closing in on the end of this story, just a little heads up. And I'd like to open up for suggestions on any stories you guys like that I should read (maybe some of your own stuff?). **

**Anyways, thank you, leave a review, follow and favorite, and please enjoy!**

 **RWTalent**

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 **James:**

"Sir," Andrew said behind me. "We've been traveling for nearly a week now, can you please tell us why we're in such a rush to get to Arendelle?"

I sighed, after trudging through forests and over mountains I did owe an explanation. I pulled the hood of my cloak further up to protect myself from another gust of cold wind. We were getting closer to Arendelle, I had started recognizing the terrain a while back, but instead of the climate returning to a more spring one it was suddenly getting colder. "We've got to get back to Arendelle as fast as we can because I think it's about to be attacked."

"What makes you think that?" Earlene asked.

"Well-" I started to say, but I felt something off in the distance, like a wave of power crashing over the land. I turned toward where I felt the power. Off in the distance a blue glow started shining on the horizon.

"Uh, what is that?" One of the Heroes asked.

The glow started growing larger and larger. The ground started rumbling, ice started crackling in the distance, a huge gust of cold air bit at our faces and forced our cloaks to flap wildly in the wind, and the bottom of my stomach dropped out. "Get to cover!"

The group scattered, taking cover behind rocks and trees. I dove behind a large boulder as the blue light washed over us. Immense cold washed over us, winds howled, and trees groaned. A huge wave of blue light washed over us. Wherever the blue light touched, snow and ice appeared. For a second time the kingdom of Arendelle was forced into a magic winter.

The group and I were covered in actual feet of snow. I forced a little magic into my hands and made them heat up. I melted my way through the snow above me. Then used a strong gust of wind to blow the snow off my companions.

"Does _that_ answer your question?" I said as the others pulled themselves out of the snow.

"What _was_ that?" Earlene asked.

"That was probably Elsa. Which means she's back, and something's going wrong." I explained. "Earlene and Andrew, take the group straight back to Arendelle. Find out what's going on there and help whoever you can. I'll go the North Mountain, that's where Elsa would be if something horrible happened."

Before anyone could respond I started off at a sprint towards Elsa's Ice Castle. The sound of angered wolves and bears sounded through the forests, not ready for the sudden change in climate. Every so often an animal would peak around a tree, but they would quickly scurry away once they saw me.

Eventually, I came out of the forest at the bottom of the North Mountain, which was once again covered in snow from top to bottom. A roar sounded from the direction of the palace, Marshmallow was very obviously not happy with the weather.

It didn't take me long to find the ice bridge that led into the Ice Palace, the problem was Marshmallow. Instead of being the normal mound of..."friendly" snow that he usually was, his ice spike and talons were extended, and had changed from Elsa's glowing blue to blood-red. The snow golem was scratching at his head grumbling and roaring in frustration.

"Marshmallow?" I called cautiously to get his attention, one hand on my sword.

The snow golem turned to me, blood red eye sockets burning into me. His lips curled up, revealing eerily red ice fangs. A deep growl from his chest caused the snow around him to vibrate softly. The giant shifted to face both shoulders at me, and his claws and back spikes grew slightly.

"Hey pal," I tried to reason with him. "Don't you remember me? It's me James, Elsa's husband."

That didn't seem to help Marshmallow at all. In fact, it seemed to make him angrier. He smacked his head a few times, then charged me; fangs and talons bared.

I rolled to one side as Marshmallow rushed past me. I drew my sword. Marshmallow turned towards me once again, I threw my free hand forward, a blast of blue magic formed a thick magic wall and forced the golem back.

"Marshmallow stop! I don't want to hurt you!"

Once again, he ignored me and charged. This time I rolled in between his legs, swinging my sword in a horizontal arc, slicing his legs off. Marshmallow fell on his face, spitting out snow and dirt, still growling.

"Please, don't get back up." I begged, knowing it was useless.

The snow golem pushed himself up. I didn't have time to keep fighting him, the problem was obviously something wrong with Elsa, I needed to find her as soon as possible. I climbed onto the giant's back and plunged my sword down into Marshmallow's back, and at the same time I called a bolt of lightning down onto the pommel of the sword, coursing into the snow creature.

The snow golem roared in pain, arching his back, lightning making his ice bones glow brightly through his snow skin, before lying face first in the snow, only breathing slightly. I pulled my blade out and walked around to face Marshmallow.

The creature seemed back to normal, the red coloring and extra ice fangs had gone away, replaced with his normal features. He looked tired, but somewhat happy to be back to normal. I squatted to face him on his level.

"I'm sorry, Marshmallow." I said. "But I have to find Elsa? Do you know where mommy is?"

The creature nodded his head. "Momma sick in head. She with bad pappa."

"Bad pappa..." I repeated, coming to the sick revelation. "Marshmallow, is Elsa with Damien? Where is she?"

"She in warm place. Angry one in home." Marshmallow managed.

Then, the lovable snow creature closed its eyes and turned into a mound of snow.

"Marshmallow? Marshmallow?!" I said, shifting around the snow. I bowed my head, I had just killed one of Elsa's first friends.

I looked up at the ice palace, someone was in there. I stood up and slowly walked up the bridge. The doors were locked, but I forced them open. Inside, the palace was still the same, just the way Elsa and I left it before the Spring Festival. I heard a sound from the lower levels.

Sword at the ready I stalked towards the stairs. The door to the secret chamber Elsa and I had built was closed, and on closer inspection I found it was locked. My patience was worn thin, I had just accidentally killed a friend, and found out my wife was sick in the head and hanging out with my evil cousin. I scowled and kicked the door. Instead of my leg being stopped, or punching a whole through the door, the entire door was forced in. The hinges and lock breaking cleanly in pieces, and the door thudding ominously on the floor.

I froze in the doorway. Sitting with their backs against the Arendelle diagram table, Anna and Kristoff looked up tiredly at me.

"Hey James, glad you could make it." Anna joked slightly, her voice rough and pained. "Boy, have you missed a bunch."


End file.
